


Long Enough to be the Villain

by MU_I



Category: Overwatch (Video Game)
Genre: Angst, Brainwashing, Emotional Manipulation, Kidnapping, M/M, Manipulation, McHanzo on side in place of cookies & warm milk, Possessive Gabriel, Sassy Soldier76, Stockholm Syndrome
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-08-05
Updated: 2017-12-12
Packaged: 2018-12-11 06:51:59
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 25
Words: 52,185
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11709114
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MU_I/pseuds/MU_I
Summary: "You either die a hero or you live long enough to see yourself become the villian"  - Aaron EckhartIt was a simple enough mission that started off about as well as any previous had. Escort the payload, shoot any hostiles within range and try to keep the insides of your head from being splattered somewhere onto one of the narrowed streets’ pavements.And then everything went terribly, terribly wrong.Separated from his team, Jack Morrison thought he was a goner when he faced the Reaper, dying and broken like a kicked puppy, lying in the middle of a puddle of his own blood.  What he didn't expect was to be given an all-expenses-paid-who-cares-about-consent trip to Talon HQ. Where he's stuck, forced to live with the man who brought him in but just as easily could have been his murderer.





	1. Everything Goes Horribly Wrong

**Author's Note:**

> First Overwatch fic, whoop! This is something that is entirely experimental, whipped up in the space of thirty minutes with the accompaniment of far too many bottles of fruit cider. 
> 
> It's more a toe in the genre and full disclosure, I love its characters but I've never played the game, so any references to weapons, armours and abilities may be entirely wrong.
> 
> It's also something that if continued, may or may not be updated weekly. A schedule may be developed in the next few days. If anything this is a side project to the more pressing stuff I have squirrelled away under the folder of 'SIN' on my laptop. Heh

It was a simple enough mission that started off about as well as any previous had. Escort the payload, shoot any hostiles within range and try to keep the insides of your head from being splattered somewhere onto one of the narrowed streets’ pavements.

Easy on paper, not so much in practice. Because the scrawled contents of the extremely lengthy lists meticulously planned and adjusted over painful hours locked up in conference rooms to the sounds of various squabbles that inevitably broke into heated disturbance flew out the very window that Widowmaker’s bullet just barrelled through.

And pretty quickly the smoothly distributed orders that had been run over for the nineteenth time before drop off pointing each member in the structured team assembled to their grossly clarified positions had descended into a base of find cover, stay down and where possible shoot any bad guy that popped up.

No, everything had gone to complete shit. As most missions did.

Jack grunted, twisting his body to the sides of the crate he had clumsily ducked behind to fire off a round of hasty bursts to the Talon agent who had only seconds ago directed their own ammunition, in a deadly arc aimed for his head. The barrage of assaulting bullets quieted, the familiar sleek body of his pulse rifle bucking slightly in his hands in a briefly protested show of recoil.

He’d lost the others. He’d been running perimeter, so sure that there would be some resistance, some ambush, leaving his companions to their assigned posts. Everything had been normal, hell, everything had been going great. MCcree had been congratulating the team on a job well done, promising drinks at the bar – of course none bought from his own pocket – when comms had momentarily cut out, deeply undermining any coordination between the spread out members.  

And then the night exploded.

His previously silent comm crackled angrily into life, the familiar overly British twang biting into his aching ears.

 _“Widowmaker on my tail, trying to shake off”_ The ever chipper Lena ‘Tracer’ Oxton breathed heavily – the lapse of stamina the only sign that she was currently being chased along darkened rooftops by one of the most dangerous snipers this side of the century. Were it not for the telling huff of exerted oxygen intake the team darling could as easily have been chirpily discussing her plans for the weekend.

Jack wouldn’t lie. He was relieved to hear from the Brit. The dead quiet of the normally chaotic line without each member screaming hoarsely over the other in the hopes of best being heard had been painfully apparent.

Soon each isolated member had chimed their own status, each pretty fucked in their own way.

 _“Y’all better believe we’re going drinkin’ after this.”_ The cowboy’s southern bite drawled, quickly accompanied by the echoed blast of the aptly named Peacekeeper. “ _I’m gonna get wasted and I’ll be damned if ya stop me from a pack o’ smokes, Han. You can fuck right off with all that health bull.”_

Hanzo’s own response was slightly overwhelmed by a sudden barrage of new fire that christened the wall to Jack’s back with a fresh bout of bullet holes, though he could easily guess the assassin had muttered something the westerner would employ the use of for later banter in the two’s regular conference room spats. Each of the ugly gashes cleft into the wall were all too easily imaginable to have been Jack’s head.

Jack swore as once again the sound of two shotguns – a sound that haunted the minds of nearly every sane team member, despite any protests that might be listed if directly told so – simultaneously firing off assaulted his senses. He forced his quivering body into a stoic calm, emptying his own heavy rain of fire before expertly reloading. He schooled his features to hide his dismay. 2 seconds. .5 slower than usual. He was slipping.

He breathed heavily and pushed himself further into the wood, knowing the blockade would do little for security but enjoying the comfort brought by knowing there was at least something preventing him from being in the direct line of his assailant’s fire. “Reaper’s here.” He announced gruffly, huffing the words out between rapid ragingly debated exchanges of ammo.

He was answered by silence. Horrible, suffocating, silence. Comms were down. Again. Winston would be going haywire at the malfunction. Probably caused by Talon’s newly recruited hacker.

“ ** _Where’s the rest of your troupe, boyscout?_** ” The wraith’s disembodied voice taunted, the words every part as lifeless as their speaker, ringing from his front, his sides, his…back.

He whirled, frantically spinning 180 and bringing his blaster up, eyes following the spine of the gun down, a sharp, traitorous escaping gasp slipping from his cracked lips as he met the painted blankly masked shadow that loomed over him like a vulture to a slowly dying animal.

The hooded form poised opposite and swathed in jet black may as well have been Death himself for all the gunned down operatives’ cares.

A scratched chuckle and the wraith descended into tarred mist, before even the coal wisped tendrils had faded and Jack was seemingly once more totally alone. Keyword being seemingly. He was completely isolated with no way of contacting any of the team unless they so happened to hurtle around the corner to his front. God he wished one of them would hurtle around the corner to his front.

There was no way Reaper would pass up the golden opportunity that had presented itself.

His suspicions were proved as a bullet ripped from thin air and embedded itself in his left shin, swiftly cutting any chances of escape down to a miserable less than ten percent. He ground his teeth but stayed upright, successfully holding back the howl of agony that had threatened to barge through his frozen lips. Super soldiers didn’t go down with just one bullet.

Reaper seemed to agree because no sooner had the first drilled into his leg then a second and a third was emptied into his person, each from different directions, each directed to seemingly random targets. But Jack knew better. His chances for successful escape or retaliation were slipping further with each landed shot. His right ankle. His left wrist. Again the left shin. He snarled, bristling furiously. Now that was just playing dirty.

“Come out and fight like a real man.” Jack growled, hoping that he sounded more confident than he felt. The situation was quickly slipping from any semblance of his control and he had a horrible suspicion it would only get worse.

In response Reaper fired a shot into Jack’s stomach. He was happy for his armour. Without it he had the feeling that his liver would have just ended up as pigeon feed along with all the other assorted thrown away edibles on the cobbled stones.

Jack answered with his own shots, but he was firing blind and hitting thin air. Widow he could have dealt with – she still retained some humanity in that she continued to live within a suit of flesh. Penetrable flesh. But Reaper was different. The perfect anti-Jack. Jack wasn’t like the assassin, he didn’t have spirits of twin dragons to call on. He wasn’t like Tracer – couldn’t blip in and out of existence to avoid fire like the close-cropped upbeat female could. He had a visor and a gun. A visor that read heat signatures which was a complete no go because Reaper had no heat to leave a signature for. And a gun that fired non-supernaturally enhanced bullets.

And how could normal bullets possibly kill a being made of mist?

Short answer; they couldn’t.

Longer, in depth, answer; he was fucked. Majorly and magnificently fucked.

As if reading his mind, or maybe just wanting to gloat, lord his victory over the weakling that had no possible way of defending himself, Reaper’s form phased into existence in the front of Jack’s face, the expressionless mask seeming to smirk at him as he viciously swung at Jack’s shin – his left one that had just eaten a steady stream of three bullets.

Jack’s features contorted in pain as he screamed, tumbling to the street’s bloodied ground like a marionette with its strings snapped when the ghost turned corporeal connected with the source of searing agony.

 ** _“Pathetic.”_** The ghost growled. And Jack had to agree. His effort had been pathetic. He hadn’t even grazed his opponent. Not once. Silently, he promised himself if he ever made it back to base alive he was going to have a long sit down with Torb and get the grey-haired engineer to create some sort of weapon – maybe something like Mei’s endothermic blasters – that meant he could at least last longer than the first round with the hellish wraith.

Jack hacked a cough through his abused lungs. “Says Mr Edgelord himself.” Maybe insulting the guy currently standing over his near unconscious, incapable of movement body hadn’t been his best idea. Him and his inability to shut his mouth whenever it was best for him. He keened sharply as a heavy boot rested on his chest before forcing itself down to a sickening crunch.

He spat blood onto the pavement, the splattered drops disappearing into the miniature lake that had pooled with his body floating in its middle like some kind of punctured inflatable. “Okay,” he wheezed brokenly, talking as best he could through a set of broken ribs and he didn’t know how many steadily leaking bullet holes. “Guess I deserved that one…and that one,” He added as Reaper’s foot lifted temporarily from his chest and once again Jack’s body was gloriously once more only his, before the heel returned, slamming down with an unspoken vengeance on Jack’s face and grinding the side of his face into a rough kiss with the chilled cobbles.

**_“Shutup.”_ **

Jack sighed to himself but reluctantly obeyed, remaining silent. He shivered, curling dejectedly into himself as best he could as the final remnants of his vision faded, sharpened lines of surroundings running into watery blurred shapes so distorted he could barely distinguish reality, Reaper’s grating laugh echoing with all the comfort of someone pressing multitudes of sharpened knitting needles into his cotton-stuffed ears.

He was sure he heard the frantic voice of Angie screeching through his visor – or maybe he was delirious from the amount of pain short-circuiting his systems – before the weight was promptly lifted from his face and the world slipped into total darkness, a change he accepted happily as he descended into the shadows that promised, if anything, a temporary peace. He figured he’d preferred to be passed out than awake when Reaper inevitabley blew his brains out.

He felt arms curl above his waist in a tightened prison, the rasping voice of his captor a perfect match to his murderer.

 ** _“Mission successful…understood…”_** A brief pause followed by the notable cock of a trigger, the muzzle cool as it pressed to his burning forehead. So he wouldn’t even have the mercy of being unconscious before Reaper slaughtered him. He numbly wondered how much it would hurt.

**_“Agent acquired. Returning to base.”_ **

The one sided exchange was enough for him to blearily pause on the edge of consciousness, a worried thought sleepily filtering through his addled mind. _Oh this couldn’t possibly be good_. Before he felt a sharpened stab shatter through what little coherent part of his self had remained and he plunged gratefully off the edge.


	2. Somehow Everything Gets Worse

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Naked, hole-y and strapped down in enemy territory. This was the moment Jack knew...  
> ...he'd fucked up.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So it seems that this will be continued, partly because I enjoy a challenge (I mean, who doesn't get a kick out of huddling in their bed over a laptop at 3am as they struggle to meet the daily deadlines of two extremely lengthy fics?) and partly because this is just way too much fun and as anyone who knows my stuff will tell you, I love torturing my characters, pushing their sanity to the very limits, before surpassing even that. 
> 
> I can't promise a regular schedule yet: if there is one it's probably going to be Sundays and Wednesdays, but I can tell you it's all been planned out and will run on for a while if all goes accordingly.

Jack didn’t tumble out of bed as he always did in a picture of graceful elegance to the incessant screech of an alarm furiously blaring an announcement of 6am. Instead he stumbled unsteadily back into the arms of consciousness, finding as he woke a sudden urge to run the nearest bathroom and retch, his first thought cutting through the dense bleariness that was his mind.

He felt terrible.

His scratched sandpaper tongue stuck lopsided at an awkward angle to the roof of his dry as a desert mouth, his throat burned as if someone had thrust a lighter to its fleshed insides and held the torched flame there for the minimum of an hour, his eyes were snapped shut - a brief attempt of dully fluttered lashes revealing they were perfectly happy to continue that way for the foreseeable future, and dear god, absolutely  _everything_ hurt.

He desperately needed to check in a mirror so as to be able to defeat his mental paranoia and fully convince himself the team’s best engineer wasn’t currently drilling the foundations for one of their custom built turrets into the top of his fractured skull.

He groaned, eyelashes scraping against dirt-crusted skin as he finally forced them back and his reluctant lids open, blinking a quick succession of rushed snapshots in a futile attempt to regain some part of order in his chaotic swimming mind. Attempt soon abandoned as a failure, he turned to the equally difficult option of keeping his eyes from returning to their strike, glaring up at a ceiling that, unless he’d turned colour blind in the last night, wasn’t his.

Because the shaded charcoal stretched in an unforgiving darkened expanse above his aching head definitely was not the soft shade of mottled egg shell blue he was greeted to come the beginning of each morning.

He clenched his jaw angrily, trying to work out which of the member of the team’s rooms he’d invaded, half registering that his face was fully exposed and his visor off – he must have left it on the bedside unit – and winced at the million screeches of protests that lent their voices to his mind at the completion of the motion.

The ceaseless pounding in his head was viciously lethal as it hijacked the best of his senses. He groaned, though the sound caught in his abused throat, whispering past his cracked lips as nothing more than a ragged whine.

That must have been one hell of a night because this was one hell of a hangover. Had he been dragged into another of McCree’s drinking contests? Those never ended in a pleasant day after. The westerner’s alcoholic exploits were legendary for a reason. The soldier was in no way a lightweight but when it came to booze, Jesse had nearly everyone on the team beaten hands down. Something he was constantly reminding anyone who chose to listen – or attempted to turn a deaf ear to.

As all were too aware of, the only one who provided the boastful westerner a challenge at the table coming in the form of the ruggedly built Japanese assassin he seemed to adore riling so much. And Mercy. The good doctor had surprised everyone on one of her first rare visits to the bar with her insanely high level of alcohol tolerance, downing an entire row of tequila drowned from bronzed bottle into half-cracked shot glasses in one sitting and demanding another to the slack jawed faces of all observing. Though no one had complained, glad that for once it was the burly westerner who was dragged back to his room by a volunteer after a poorly planned challenge, drunk off his ass like a skunk bathed in bourbon.

He blinked once more, raising a hand groggily to the side of his head so as to steady the spinning carousel of images in front.

Or he would have, if not for the harsh impact of some solid that absolutely refused to give, despite his best efforts pinning his entire arm in place. Unease found its place in the pit of his stomach, only growing in its comfort as the world finally found its feet and ceased to sway, the room coming into coherent focus at last.

And suddenly all Jack wanted to do was scrunch his eyes shut and return to the sanctuary of wreathed darkness he had previously been so eager to escape.

The force that had stayed his arm came in the form of jet leather straps that had been lashed across his biceps and wrists, the tanned hide matching to those cut similarly in to his ankles, forehead, neck, stomach and thighs. Each blackened hunk spanned roughly five inches in width, secured in place by a series of brass buckles that met the belts at the edges of the slab he’d been strapped to.

This was no amateur job; despite the basic design in technique of confinement and the closeness in his proximity to the buckles, he was entirely incapacitated, any struggles immediately rebuked by the harshness of his holdings. He was unable to move, paralysed save for an angry flex of his fingers or violent wiggle of ends of toes.

Panic welled to the forefront of his mind as any hopes that this was an extremely elaborate practical joke pulled off by a mystery individual on the team – McCree – dropped like a lead balloon. Images of last night rose with the bile that swilled at the edges of his mouth as his mind ever so helpfully reminded him of exactly how he had come to be in this sorry state.

The mission. Running perimeter solo, the disruption of comms, separation from the team.  **Reaper.**  His pitiful retaliation. And one all too clear memory of his head pinned against bloody stones to the wraith’s amusement.

Fear clawed at his throat as realisation dropped on him like a grand piano pushed from sixty storeys above. Lately Angie had been saying with an increasing ferocity that he needed a break from the stress of battle, the healer vehement in her argument that some much needed time off would do him a world of good. Well, Reaper had just booked him an all-expenses-who-cares-about-consent trip to Talon HQ.

It was a humourless thought that barely pulled the suggestion of a smile to the corners of his lips. It was difficult to see the funny side of things when tied up in your enemy’s base and awaiting your inevitable, swiftly approaching death. Because of course that was why he remained alive.

Reaper wouldn’t be satisfied shooting him in the streets like some stray nameless puppy to die a forgotten death. Sadistic bastard probably wanted to film his humiliating end and send the tape to his team, titled simply ‘Soldier Fucks Up’.

And he had – because how else could you possibly describe being strapped naked to a hospital bed in the enemy home base? He’d fucked up. Plain and simple.

The jack-hammering thud of his heart slammed against his ribcage threatening to rip past the cage of bone and flesh to escape by itself _,_ was more a timer than a sign of life. Each signal of pulse echoed in his buzzing ears the second hand of a clock that ticked down, falling slower and slower until his captor finally decided enough and brought an end to its time.

A quick sweep of the room did little to dissipate the spread of terror that threatened to overthrow any rational thought. The space he had been thrown to was cramped; hardly a quarter of the size of his usual quarters, and tallying the room’s furnishings took all the space of thirty seconds.

The entirety of which consisted of the bed that he was strapped to, more a hospital gurney than a thing of rest, a painfully familiar reminder of the frequented med bay back at Watchpoint: Gibraltar, something akin to a dog bowl shoved against the left corner of the wall that he desperately prayed he wouldn’t be forced to drink out of, from the poorly-angled gaze his restraints allowed it appeared to be half-filled, the cover of the liquid inside greyed and fogged, and lastly the uneasily noted weighted metal rings bolted to the walls giving the entire place the scream of rustic nineteenth century torture chamber.

Each of the three walls encroaching on his vision offered no relief from the unforgiving barren grey wastelands that seemed the design aimed for, and from the lack of lights streaming from behind his head he was positive the unseen fourth was no exception.

His heart very quickly plummeted to the soles of his exposed feet. The suffocatingly claustrophobic room he was held in was equally parts as agonisingly dull as it was effective in its imprisonment.

He felt a sliver of chill stutter across the length of his spine and cast his gaze downwards, only to immediately rise back up to the ceiling, furiously blushing. His cheeks flamed a vicious lobster scarlet as his eyes drilled into the endless pool of coal. Because Jack’s wardrobe was just as lacking in décor as his prison.

He swallowed heavily in a semi-successful effort to push back the nauseous slick that had risen from his gullet to the backs of his teeth. His face was fully exposed, causing an additional pound of weight to be added to the near unbearable stack already piled to his burdened back. His visor was gone and he highly doubted it was anywhere but sitting on a desk in some Talon labcoat’s office.

Had his hands been able, they would have swept angrily across the plains of his creased brow. If he ever made it back, Winston was going to kill him for losing that. His heavy breaths rapidly increased to near hyperventilation at the thought of the stoic, peanut-butter obsessed ape. He forced them back to an even rhythm, dragging his concentration in a reluctant return to further assess his situation. Sadly headgear wasn’t the only equipment misplaced.

His fitted cargo pants – gone. His thickly padded armoured boots – nowhere in sight. His ’76 signature army jacket and the black tee beneath – vanished.

He felt a pang of grief at the last absentee. Cargo pants and boots were replaceable, but the jacket had always held a special place in his heart and the idea of a Talon agent – or worse, Reaper – ripping it off his unconscious body only to throw it in an incinerator sat heavily on his shoulders.

Other than a pair of boxers – he almost cried in relief that at least he still had those to his name – that clung uneasily to his hips; he was as bare as the day he’d been born.

Which begged the question – had his captor stripped him? He shuddered, disgusted. Reaper’s creeping tendrils sliding over his skin as they slowly undressed his increasingly exposed form was not a pleasant image, nor one he had ever wished to possess.

His nose scrunched as he grunted, pleased at least to know that his mouth had not been forced to endure the same bondage as the rest of his body. Not that it would do much good for his situation – he highly doubted he would be allowed on his merry way if he asked the big bad to please let him go oh so very nicely.

He pursed his lips and attempted a whistle, something extremely ironic and self-deprecating. He managed to push the first few bars of ‘ _Always Look on the Bright Side of Life_ ’ through his reluctant chords, hitting the first chorus before his chest descended into its own strummed melody of pure agony. The forced cheery notes promptly spluttered out, his tongue falling uselessly to rub restlessly at the sides of his dried mouth.

Jack didn’t know what would be worse, the mind-numbing hours spent with nothing to do but contemplate his approaching end, or the presence of his captor. After what felt like the passage of endless hours that could just have easily been mere minutes – it was difficult to tell the difference of time without windows or any source of light – he had his answer. The deadweight door slid open, a shred of illumination following the feet of the figure entered, and suddenly Jack was left very much mourning his isolation.

He hadn’t thought it possible that anything about the situation could get worse but apparently something could, and that something was currently eyeing him like a ravenous wolf eyed the sacrificial lamb someone had just thrown at its feet.

Reaper had remained in costume, form still lost in the swirling void of jet that hung off his shoulders, face still hidden behind the expressionless grim skull mask. Apparently the guy had the constant need to dress as someone who had raided a store the night before Halloween and didn’t know the definition of the word  _seasonal_.

His captor lounged; managing to look equally relaxed as he did terrifying, arms caged to his chest in the definition of intimidation at the centre of the room, and somehow Jack knew that beneath the hollowed mask the bastard was smirking. “ ** _Feeling talkative, Sleeping Beauty?”_** The shade rasped, tauntingly.

In the little mobility he retained access to, Jack dropped four fingers into his palm to flip him off, feeling a small bolt of satisfaction challenge the iron tight grapple of despair that had warped his thoughts, a small, minutely comforting warmth filtering through his previously frozen into reluctant submission limbs at the one manageable act of defiance.

He locked eyes with the hollowed sockets, a flicker of pride to the gaze, years of training kicking in to remind him that he had seen worse, that this was nothing compared to the devastation left in the wake of the Omnic Crisis, that this barely competed with the sights he had witnessed, of bodies strewn haphazardly in clumsy piles stretching across endless miles of road.

He glared, hissing angrily. “I ain’t telling you jack shit.”

“ ** _Well isn’t that a shame.”_** The responding gloating purr told Jack it was anything but. It was almost like Reaper had been hungrily anticipating his refusal. ** _“I guess I’ll have to find a way to loosen that tongue of yours then.”_**

Jack blinked, unsure of what exactly Reaper was playing at as he approached the gurney in laboured foreboding steps. He stiffened as the demon leaned over his bound form, a ghostly tendril running over his knee in a sickeningly loving caress, before suddenly the end had morphed into jagged talons that sank into his left shin, sinking deeply into the gorge of absent flesh drilled by three bullets.

Tears threatened the edges of his scrunched eyes and his mouth flew open in an inhuman, guttural howl, his features twisting as new lines pulled at his screwed face, white spots dancing across his otherwise blinded peripherals. The straps shuddered as they fought to freeze his body in place.

 ** _“Now,”_**  Reaper cooed, claws shifting to fingers that gently coaxed over his cut open flesh.  ** _“Let’s try again. Feeling talkative, Sleeping Beauty?”_**

Jack laughed, but the sound was hollow and forced, unnatural through his rattling teeth. His breath was shaky and the words slurred. “I’d tell you to go to hell but it looks like you’ve already been. Could have left the costume department behind though.”

 ** _“Real_   _funny, boyscout."_** Reaper ground, tone dripped in heavy sarcasm. ** _"But we’ll see who’s laughing. You act real big and tough. But you’ll break in the end. They all do.”_**

“And how you gonna do that, Corpse Breath? Subject me to four hours of your favourite death metal screamo?” Jack cockily retorted, an eyebrow gently riding up. Resorting to name calling was highly immature, but there was little option left to do when the best he could muster of a physical attack was an angry toe furiously waved in the direction of his jailer with all the intimidation of a sneezing kitten.

He knew he must have succeeded in riling  _something_ under that mask because barely a moment had passed before Reaper growled darkly; the tops of the space that Jack guessed were his shoulders twitching in their efforts to contain the wraith’s building wrath.

A hand crawled lazily across his cheek before the fingers jarringly running across his skin hardened, the crack of skin on skin resounding in the empty space between tormentor and tormentee. His head snapped back, his skull jumping against the bite of the gurney behind.

Jack blinked owlishly, lost to momentary confusion as he wondered why the side of his face had suddenly chosen to explode into loudly voiced irritation. The unexpected backhand was accompanied by a low darkened chuckle. **_“I’m going to enjoy taming that mouth of yours.”_**  

Jack screeched, flinching as Reaper’s hands snapped out, restraints making any escape impossible as the thumb and forefinger parted to span the base of his neck, any rational sense other than  _insert air please_ quickly forgotten as the wraith’s grip tightened to completely block his airways.

He bucked against the hand that held him, his floundering legs kicking and flailing as his body revolted, reality slipping away from beneath his grasp once more.

He held him until Jack was ready to nosedive into the siren call of darkness pulling seductively at his psyche, the drop of grasp accompanied by a choked gurgle, his numbed mind barely registering the lack of hand on throat when the fingers eventually withdrew.

 ** _“It’ll be fun.”_  **Jack sucked in his cheeks, teeth scraping across the end of his tongue and wisely decided to withhold broadcasting his rebuttal of that statement. It figured that Reaper would enjoy his suffering, but for Jack, nothing about this horrible situation was fun in the slightest.  ** _“Well, maybe for me. Probably not for you.”_** Reaper added slowly, thoughtful musings eerie in their echoes of Jack’s thoughts.

“ ** _Best make yourself comfortable boy. You’ll be staying here a while.”_** He promised, the swathe of black cloak billowed outwards, a tsunami of stormy waves that rippled angrily across his broadened figure as he spun away, striding further from Jack’s vision.

Jack’s screams of desperation followed the back of the wraith turned on its heels, his shaking yowls flooding the room. The effort shredded the remains of his lungs, falling painfully dead on each of the four blank walls as he struggled, frantically thrashing his body against its confines with a newfound determination, hollers of death threats raining on his captor that when ignored fell to streams of stringed swears so colourful they would bring drunken sailors to blush as to his despair the door slammed shut, the hateful shade disappeared, in one last form of cruelty stealing with it all form of light, and Jack found himself pitifully alone, cast in murky darkness once more.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I have an unhealthy obsession for hurting characters and everything I touch turns to darkness, sadness and angst. Lots of angst. Like much of my writing, this shall not be a happy one. 
> 
> Do tell me if I have any information wrong, I enjoy being yelled at by strangers and I hear wikipedia is not the most reliable source of information.
> 
> That being said I shall see you whenever I next see you, which will probably be a lot sooner than both of us are expecting.  
> ~MUI


	3. Missing in Action

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Gabe gets visited by the Ghost of Relationships Past

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A short look at Gabe's inner workings (angst) and the team's handling of the absence of one of their own

**_Best make yourself comfortable, boy.”_**   Gabe paused before adding with a vindictively spiked maliciousness,  ** _“You’ll be staying here a while.”_**

He closed his eyes in half-lidded ecstasy as Jack’s despairing screeches accompanied his dramatically pronounced exit of the room.

To anyone else the ghost strapped to the interrogation table would have been unrecognisable. Even Gabe himself had at first missed realising the identity of the supposed stranger, but now, in the company of sufficiently  toned lighting and a calmed atmosphere lacking the excitement of battle, the face was impossible to mistake.

Some other person may have failed to link those silvered tufts of hair that stuck rigidly to lightly bronzed tan to a sun-kissed, caramel gold mop. They might have skimmed, uninterested, over the scar permanently staining the left side of a creased cheek. They might even have skipped over the worn baby blue eyes that somehow retained some semblance of innocence to their image despite the countless war-torn scenes they had witnessed.

But not him. Not Gabe. He knew that face as he knew every inch of its owner’s form, every deeply etched scar scraped across battle-hardened skin, every mole and lovespot to disrupt the rippled lines of toned muscle that hung from bleached bone, every place he had run his fingers across and caressed gingerly, as if handling some priceless antique, on the nights spent in the waned glow of dappled grey, beneath the warmth of shared covers or bitter bite of open air.

(Ex)Strike Commander Jack Morrison. The golden boy of the golden age. Both of which supposed to be long dead. Both struck dead on the same day. Gabe growled, angrily swiping a hand – the hand that had near choked Jack to a second death only moments prior – across his face as he swept from the room.

His shoulders shuddered as his form battled to control the rage brewing beneath his surface that seductively whispered this problem could just as easily be sorted as it had come about with the subtlety of two simultaneous shotguns blast to the face. Gabe was not one for keeping his problems alive. And if he did it the traditional, fast n’ easy way he would save on paying a visit to Arlington National Cemetery to dig up the coffin so as to kindly inform the charred remains of the corpse inside the wooden prison that it should be fucking dead.

Dead. Not living. Not breathing. Certainly not – poorly – armed, decked out in full battle gear and running the darkened streets of London alone at 11pm. And definitely not secured down in near unconscious state in one of his base’s interrogation chambers.

And yet, here they were.

Jack fucking Morrison. Gabe sighed. He wouldn’t lie and say he hadn’t pissed off a lot of people in his lifetime and the next; he’d readily admit he’d done more than enough to earn an unhealthy amount of his own haunting ghosts of the past.

He just wished as he stalked down the corridor, sending any agent unfortunate enough to happen upon him promptly leaping against the wall in an attempt not to get what little of the meagre brains they possessed blown to the ceiling fans, that this particular ghost could have had the common courtesy to remain dead.

Jack was a part of his past. A painful part he expressed no desire to revisit. And any attempt made to would depressingly, but inevitably, end with one of, if not the both of their’s, death. He was Gabriel Reyes, consort to Morrison and commander of Blackwatch no longer. Just as the captured, soon to be tortured man was no longer (Ex)Strike Commander Jack Morrsion than Soldier76. Reyes was gone. Only Reaper remained.

“Oh?” The emergence of a sharpened mocking tone brought his inner monologue to an abrupt end, throwing his focus back to the excessively illuminated corridor, a vivid splash of purple disrupting the otherwise blanketed white walls. “Leaving the new boy toy so soon, Gabe?” Sombra’s half-shaven eyebrow arched at the condescending purr, the female irritation lounged casually into the frame of her quarter’s door, her arms locked in a tight cage to her chest, hip jutted languidly to the side as one leg crossed in severe form over the other.

The newest addition to their little group was proving to be near in difficulty to handle as Widow, the emotionless femme fatale hardly made for a decent companion, but at the least her loyalties were mostly ensured. In stark contrast, the newly recruited Sombra had her own series of agendas, and constantly skipped out of line of fire to further them. If it held even the slightest possibility of enlarging any pay check doled out she wouldn’t hesitate to sell their entire operation out. Not to mention the simple matter of attitude.

“Shutup.” He growled in open irritation, in no mood to deal with the fellow, rage-inducing Mexican.

The other brow rode delicately up to join its companion in a caress of darkened rooted hairline. “Is that any way to talk to the girl who helped get your new pet into his playpen?”

“I do not call messing her job up halfway ‘helping’” Reaper snarled, pausing in his movements to glower fully at the female.

A hand uncurled from its tightened lock to rise to her face, lips pulled to an exaggerated pout and features shifting to a bored expression as she ran an eye over the tips of each purpled nail in feigned disinterest. “Next time you try playing tech support then.” She announced snippily. “I was just wondering why the mighty Reaper, slayer of thousands, brought a cute sick little puppy in out of the rain.”

“Curiosity killed the cat,” Gabe hissed tightly.

“And satisfaction brought it back, so go on,” She locked eyes goadingly with him over her outstretched fingers. “Satisfy me.”

“I do not have to play your little game,  _Sombra_.” He felt a slither of satisfaction as the female shivered, backing away into the wall ever so slightly in veiled fear as he stalked closer to her, pulling his form to full height to loom over the top of her head and leaned down, the edges of her eyes widening in semi-controlled fear. “As ordered, comms stay down. Next time I will not be so forgiving. Is that clear or must I illustrate my point?”

The bobbed stutter of her throat in a telling gulp was quickly followed by a brief shake of head, a muted petulant “No,” sulkily hissed out through equally reluctant lips. It was no secret that Sombra hated showing subservience or fear towards anyone. Making Gabe’s exposure of both deeply satisfying. It was about the only good thing he could say about the woman. Apart from perhaps the second point – that her purple-tailed highlights would look spectacular hanging, along with the rest of her severed head, from his wall.

She visibly relaxed as Gabe withdrew from his invasion of her space and recommenced his angered prowl across the bleached tiles.

“He’s going to die in that room if you leave him, Gabe.  You know that!” She called tauntingly after his hurriedly receding back. Reaper remained silent. He did know that. But Jack Morrison deserved to die. He angrily threw the door to the base’s training room open and stalked inside, fingers already lovingly grazing over the surface of his withdrawn double shotguns.

After all, he allowed a thinned smile to lick the corners of his otherwise straightened lips as the target downed, a fresh bullet hole smouldered through its painted forehead, and the first shot sang its haunted melody, the dead should stay dead. Gabriel Reyes knew that best of all.

* * *

 

Lena was the first one to break the awkward silence that had settled in rare occasion around the sombrely-aired room. “So,” she announced, fingers playing in a stilted succession of awkward taps on the edge to her front, upbeat persona equally as rare in its fading as the forced tightened smile wilted, the closely-cropped brunette shuffling awkwardly in her seat as she voiced the exact thoughts of all present in a somewhat broken, tinned tone. “What are we going to do?”

The meeting had come as no surprise to any of the team. It had been five days since the mission in London that had resulted in the rushed trips of nearly half present to the good doctor’s medical bay, each varying in the severity of their injuries. Hanzo had received the lightest, coming away from the obvious setup with barely a bruised eye. Lena herself sported a fresh bullet wound to her shoulder courtesy of the purple-skinned sniper; Winston was freshly released from Angela’s watchful care after bearing the brunt of a concussion, but Soldier was the worst. His seated place between the Brit and gunslinger, usually always filled, now painfully empty.

They’d scoured the streets – no easy feat to complete when the majority of the capital city was poured to the pavements in terrified uproar, their homes fled to the symphony of bullet shots that zipped not-so-gracefully through the air – but even after the hours spent ceaselessly searching, no sign of the silver-haired elder had been found, his comm missing and so far untraceable. The chances that the agent had somehow slipped off on his own in the chaos of the sprung ambush had dwindled since the first but finally totally diminished on the fourth day of lost contact. Now nearing the sixth, it was widely but grievously accepted that the Soldier was either dead, or captured.

“Break him out,” Jesse answered immediately from his place across the table, his voice gruff and speech slightly slurred so as to indicate exactly how he had spent his time in the hours leading up to the arranged meet. His darkened face was unusually grim in its expression, his limbs clenched tightly to his form as if ready to spring into action – a sharp cry from his usual casual demeanour of folded over one knee legs and fingers tiredly unscrewing to re-screw the cork of his hip flash – though only after sneaking a hasty swig from the silvered vial. His determinedly offered opinion sparked the sudden outcry of each member that rapidly split the team to two separated factions.

“It is too dangerous.” No one was surprised when Hanzo’s softly spoken voice countered the accented twang. With McCree’s penchant for everything big and bold, and the Japanese clansman’s own approach preferable to stealth and invisibility, the two were polar opposites and the gathered group often found the oversized conference room as the main stage for the two to butt heads over their ideals. “We do not even know if he remains alive. And they will be expecting us. We must trust the Soldier to escape on his own.”

“My brother, er, Hanzo,” Genji hastened to correct himself under the answering pierced glare of the previous speaker before continuing. “Is right. I do not like this any more than any of you, but if Talon are holding him they will have prepared measures to prevent his rescue.”

Lucio, one of the youngest of all assembled, shook his head angrily, the DJ’s fingers nervously drumming across the surfaces of his shins in frenzied rhythm. “We can’t just abandon him!” to which McCree voiced his assent and the Shimadas retaliated, their soft voices lost in the vocalised torrent of speech.

“You are quiet, Angela.” Winston’s loud voice boomed, bringing all other conversation to a hushed standstill. “What are your thoughts on this matter, Doctor?” All turned from the hulking ape sat at the table’s head to the blonde beauty occupying the place at the opposite end.

Angela sighed unhappily. “It is many lives risked for solely one. I do not approve of the idea, but the Shimadas are correct. They will be awaiting our arrival. And we will be forced to meet them on their terms. Last time that did not go so well.”

Hana glumly raised her head from its slumped fallen perch on the table. “So, we’re not going to break into Talon Home Base?”

“That is the best option available.” Hanzo answered tightly.

“That’s leaving him to die and you know it!” The American immediately countered in a guttural roar, leaping violently across the glass plain as if to jump his challenger, only to be hauled back into his place by the burly arms of the engineer to his left who, with the assistance of Angela managed to secure him back into his seat, the depths of which he fell with a scowl reluctantly back into.

“We have to do something, and fast.” Lena piped up from her corner, emerging into the heated debate for the first time since her reserved breaching of the topic. “If we take too long, what’s to stop Talon from doing to Soldier what they did to Amelie?”

An unnatural silence again filled the room as all awkwardly bowed their heads to cast their gaze downwards at the mention of the former friend, each lost to their own darkly recalled memories of the now enemy, the lull disrupted by the sudden pound of Jesse’s fist angrily slammed to the table. “I’m mighty shamed at all y’all, we ain’t just leaving him to Talon, he’s part of the team. That means if there’s a chance he’s alive, we go.”

“Enough!” Winston roared over the consequent returned eruption of raised voices. “We will discuss this,” He sighed heavily, one meaty paw reaching for the edge of his glasses, “At a later date. When all present can remain civil.” Each member swivelled in turn to glare at Jesse who simply shrugged from where he sat. “Till then we may only hope Soldier76 manages to find his own way back to us.” He tiredly waved his hand towards the exit. “Dismissed.”


	4. Murphy's Law Can Go Suck It

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> How to train your Soldier
> 
> WARNING NON CON

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So I've still to properly work a schedule out but I think this will be updating regularly on a Thursday and Tuesday

Jack’s tongue scraped hollowly against the sides of his mouth. The thrumming pounds plaguing his head had remained an unhappy constant. His eyes had grown used to the veiled pitch of his room and could now easily pick out each minutely detailed offering off the walls that held him, having already memorised the positioning of every hairline fissure splintered in brief respite through the darkened scape and each ever so slight appearance of other colours – the bleached white of the table he’d remained strapped to, morphed to a dulled grey in the almost constant shadow, the thinned darkened shadow cast to the door and the coppered flecks staining the wall directly opposite his view in what he desperately hoped wasn’t, but knew giving his surroundings probably was, blood.

He blinked his eyes as if hoping to clear the fog from his mind, impatiently exercising the last parts of control he had over his mobility in the struggled flex of forefinger. Boredom was a large factor to his unhappy mental plight.

He spent his time slipping in and out of restless consciousness, any time awake passed mostly in isolation. On occasion he would be graced with the presence of the wraith who had brought him here, and that was a statement passed with less sarcasm than should have. He hated his jailer with violent passion, splitting the rest of his awakened hours between plans of escape and imagining the many painful deaths he would bring if ever rid of his bonds.

The flavour of the day so far was swinging towards disembowelment. Jack was not a sadistic kind of guy – he tried his best to kill as painlessly as possible. But for his captor, he’d be happy to make an exception. He hated Reaper, but he hated the isolation more.  

At points it seemed he’d been taken only to be left forgotten until his mind inevitably cracked. And then Reaper would visit to explore how talkative he was feeling that particular day. Those visits had quickly developed their own routine of Reaper entering, interrogating and mocking Jack, who perhaps to his foolishness, responded in similar ilk, evading each question by ridiculing anything possible, from why exactly he was here to the monster’s dress sense. Then Reaper would lose patience and make his dramatically rolled out exit, leaving Jack not so much writhing as forced still in agony his screams narrating his captor striding away, fingers sporting a fresh dusting of scarlet as they slammed the door only to re-enter at the next opening point of visiting hours and vicious cycle commence once more.

There had been that one time where Jack had awoken to the sensation of touch – finding it strange but given the costume choice extremely believable, that Reaper would torture him as he slept – snapping his eyes open to find the monster silently focused in his activity of digging through the drilled holes in his open leg, a small collection of rounded, crimson ensconced spheres to the side of his feet.

But when Jack had questioned it – for once too tired to form any taunt – his jailer had replied with a simple but extremely foreboding hissed, “ ** _Keeping you alive_** ,” resumed his task and left soon after, leaving Jack shivering and stewed in worry as his mind ever so helpfully filled the sentence with an ominously voiced question of _for what?_

He wrenched the sandpaper across his canines, briefly considering screwing his eyes to force what little moisture he could from them in the hopes that some droplets might perhaps chance his lips. He had long since lost all feeling in the majority of his limbs, the sole exception his forefinger, much good that did, an unfortunate occurrence brought about by remaining forced into the same position for what he suspected must be nearing a week. But even in the face of total paralysis, the thirst was the worst.

In the time that he’d been here he’d seen nothing of solid sustenance, but more pressingly a near equal rarity to any kind of liquid. Food he could go without for three weeks, water was a necessity for three days, and the last time he had seen any part of it pass his gullet was three sleeps and two Reaper visits ago, when the bastard had taken a filled water flask, held it tauntingly out of reach to waft beneath his nose, before pouring almost its entirety to the tiles at his booted feet, slathering the last drops on the edges of his fingers and goadingly pushed them to Jack’s lips, commanding a hardened ‘suck’, to which Jack, to his utter mortification, had obeyed, hungrily cleaning each drop from the starkly white bleached gloves.

He slid the appendage across his fractured dry lips as the door snapped, signalling the beginning of the latest dance to be held between the captor and his captive jester. It had become habit to learn his jailer’s mannerisms so as to know whether the line could be cartwheeled across or cautiously toed near, so as not to end up in Talon’s intensive care wing. He grimaced. This was a bad day, which meant leaning off on the comedy or ending with a fresh bullet hole through his shoulder.

He imagined the face beneath the mask to be glowering as its owner stormed in, slight twitch of the shoulders telling Jack that the figure was absolutely livid. As always on particular bad days, the guy made no move to silence his steps – each hardened impact of thickened leather hide slammed to the grimed tile ringing out a death knell – as he stalked towards the table, grunting in greeting.

Jack shivered. This was one of the worst days he’d seen since his first waking after his capture. Fury was rolling off the man loomed in front in waves, his claws cutting into the edges of the table Jack was strapped to, leaving dashed gashes when they withdrew.

Jack’s eyes scrunched in preparation for those talons to find a new target, bracing for pain, surprise filtering through slowly, as if in disbelief, as air rushed to his ears and he impossibly _fell_ forwards. He briefly wondered if he’d finally left his sanity behind with his freedom, or if it really was the ground pressed in a harsh kiss to the left side of his face.

He cautiously opened an orb to a screwed half-lid, finding himself in a staring contest with the toe of Reaper’s ashen boot. He experimentally commanded a leg to move and _holy shit it worked_. Granted it was a twitch rather than the aimed for kick which meant a lack of roundhouses for the foreseeable future, but he batted away any despair brought by the limit of success. He didn’t care, for the first time in what must have been a week, _he could move_.

Any happiness very quickly disappeared as a snarled order from the observer loomed above him brought him back to the reality that despite the lack of bonds currently strapped to his person he was far from free. And was currently lain across the ground with his ass lifted inelegantly into the air like a rutting dog in heat and possessing all the strength of a new-born babe in front of one of Talon’s best and deadliest operatives. So…not the time to celebrate.

Jack’s focus followed the unfurled arm stretched to a severe point to the dog bowl positioned in the corner. “ ** _Drink._** ”

His eyes slid from their dubious glance at the top of the bowl back up to his jailer, his chin pressed to the cold stone as his gaze ascended from the hobnailed boots to the shadowed cloak obscuring the body beneath. He couldn’t possibly expect him to drink the gunk from the bowl like some animal, could he?

As if in answer to his thoughts, Reaper growled impatiently. “ ** _It’s the only thing you’re getting, so drink_**.”

Jack blanched, trying to figure out exactly how serious his tormentor was. From the appearance of the sternly cross-armed form, very. He balked. Anything was better – he’d even lick the bastard’s fingers again if it meant possible escape from this fate.

“ ** _Fine, go ahead, die_**. **_It does not matter to me_**.” The dense shadows rippled elegantly across his form as he shrugged. “ ** _One less dog to the world_**.”

Jack’s head snapped as Reaper strode quickly to the corner with the offending object, striking a stance and moved one leg from behind the folds of the cloak, as if to kick the bowl to its side. His body quivered in bristled despair, not caring if the action was a bluff. A stretch of the definition, maybe, but at some point that had been drinkable water. And as his throat howled in angry reminder, he needed it dammit.

The toe rested to the bowl’s side, stayed by the panicked whimper that fell past Jack’s lips, twisted in their silenced _no_ his torn throat wouldn’t allow to screech aloud. “ ** _Oh?_** ” Reaper called in feigned exclamation. “ ** _So you do want it, do you, little bitch? Very well then,”_** Reaper purred cockishly. “ ** _Fetch_**.”

Jack blinked dully at the order, indignation rising. He pushed the outrage aside in favour of cowardly self-preservation, flushing in darkened shame as he attempted to crawl on his numbed limbs over to the corner of the room. His parts dragged hollowly across the expanse at an almost stand-still pace, each inch managed robbing him of the majority of breath stored in his lungs.

It was a poor effort and soon even Reaper tired of the pitiful sight of Jack’s laboured shuffling’s; the shade huffing in broadly forecast annoyance as he stooped, grabbed the bowl and dropped it closer, exaggerating each motion with narrated snarl as if a moodily rebelling teen forced to action by parents.

Jack emitted a rattled low whine as talons threaded roughly through his hair, the clawed hand yanking his face up for the toe of the heavy boot to bullishly kick the bowl beneath his chin, the violence upsetting the top layer of browned sheen, droplets angrily staining the tiles.

He eyed the pool in front, thrown to inner turmoil. Part raged that there was no way he would stoop to the treatment and drink like a cur at his master’s heels, another, much larger, deeper instinct told him the simple logic. He was dying of thirst. This was water.

He weakly moved his fingers as if to grasp for the sides and lift the bowl to his lips, but the action cut short and he wheezed a yelp, startled howl breaking as Reaper’s boot, sensing movement, pounced on the limbs, crushing them beneath his weighted heel.

Jack’s figure cowed further as realisation dawned, lashes tearful as they lowered in utter defeat, cheeks a burnt scarlet as pride gave into demanding need and he greedily pressed his chapped lips to the water’s edge, tongue lapping across the murkily tanned liquid.

He choked on the first mouthful, liquid burning the insides of his nostrils as he pressed too close, unused to the technique. The swill tasted about as appetizing as it had looked, but he forced it down, the fear of its absence trumping any affordable pickiness.

He gagged, the next leaving the insides of his gullet feeling as if someone had tipped a sizeable dose of gasoline down its tract before dropping a lit match past his stubbed pearls.

He spluttered, face reddening as he brokenly attempted to remember how to breathe. Reaper watched from the side in triumphant silence. For once he was glad of the quiet. The entire experience, humiliating to his core as it was, would be so much more with added commentary.

Recovered, he returned, drowning his gullet with the entire contents of the bowl within moments. He mewled in complaint as the object was yanked roughly away, its perch lost, his head falling on its front to the dampened stone.

 “ ** _Isn’t that better?”_** The voice of Reaper boomed from above him, as if shouted directly through his ears. ** _“Now, what do you say?_** ”

He flushed further. Like hell he was going to express gratitude towards his captor. He smiled brokenly, ignoring all screams of self-preservation instinct and stammered a ragged “Fuck you.”

His defiance was horrifyingly met by a chuckle. “ ** _Oh Jack. Jaaaaack.”_** The monster crooned. ** _“And you were doing so well._** ” He bent his form till level with Jack’s face, a hand curled to lift and caress his face in a loving manner. “ ** _It seems someone must be taught their manners_**.”

Jack screeched as the hand threw his head to the ground, the scene blurring to the sickening crunch of his skull slamming against concrete, but before he could attempt to crawl away Reaper was on him, a flurry of slicing talons and directed kicks, whizzing through the air in accelerated speed, unseen until Jack was roaring in pain and sporting a new purpled welt or crevasse in his flesh.

 ** _“No, no Jack.”_** Jack’s vision swam as a boot connected with his solar plexus. “ ** _That won’t do. When we are given nice things we say thank you.”_**

He snapped his eyes shut and attempted to curl his strained limbs into his chest. There was a lull in the rained violence but he resolutely withheld his vision, clear in the terror that any hint of its return would see a resurgence in the torrents of assaults.

The lull stuttered as weight curled to the back of his head and Jack flinched, readying for the barrage only to be propelled unexpectedly forward, surprise forcing the lids open. Immediately he wished he’d remained ensconced in voided darkness.

The demon chortled, a tendril wisp detaching from his form to slip the cloak open, revealing his manhood, its tip glistening in crystal flecks, disgustingly already dripped in pre-cum. Jack felt a wave of revulsion as he realised the bastard had aroused at his humiliations. **_“If you won’t show appreciation for water, maybe you will for a different style of liquid?”_**

He tried to flail, bucking weakly as his fingers scraped uselessly to the ground they were dragged across in hopes of finding some grip that may displace the tendril reeling him, but dear god the monster enjoyed it, and he knew it was a lost battle. A malnourished, dehydrated, semi-conscious male against a well-fed, supernatural monster. The winner had already been decided. Anything that suggested otherwise were simply the toying’s of a child allowing a captured insect save few moments of hope.

He snapped his mouth shut determinedly, but found a clawed talon pinched to his nose, its razor edge sinking almost to the bone in its squeeze, continuing its hold until his lips were jarred open to gasp hurriedly for oxygen. The moment the lines quirked apart he was shoved forward, practically speared on the head of Reaper’s member.

He gagged on reflex at the entrance, the cock shoved through his unwilling mouth and to the backs of his throat. Tears tracked down Jack’s face, painted by the force of Reaper’s rhythmic thrusts that are more manic slams as they pulled back, drove forward, pulled back, drove forward, the member filling his cavern’s entirety and barging roughly past his dentals, Jack’s cries and pleas to end muffled as they mixed with Reaper’s heady gutted moans.

The _thing_ – he refuses to admit its name, because he’s a super soldier and super soldiers don’t end up in prison cells with their enemies’ dicks shoved down their throats – is warmed and disgustingly slimed from Jack’s saliva.

After a particularly energetic thrust he’s tempted to gnash his teeth against the pulsing flesh in its next journey, but god knows how that would end. Probably with a trip to Arlingotn. This time with an actual corpse to fill the box of death.

He considered it, though shamefully doesn’t follow through, too terrified of the consequence. This was very clearly a show of power rather than demand for pleasure, given that the wraith was sated to violent thrusts and so far expressed no wish for Jack's participation in any way other than providing his unwilling mouth. A show designed to inform him of his exact, entirely helpless, position. One he knew best to interrupt.

He didn’t want to die. He’d always thought he’d make it to retirement. Either that or kick the bucket in battle. Sacrificed to save the many. The noble hero thing. He knew he’d die eventually. He’d signed his death warrant away the day of his enlistment and now was just waiting for it to be cashed in. But he didn’t want to die. Not here. Not like that.

He closed his eyes in an attempt to escape the horror show playing out to his front, once again finding himself considering the what ifs he’s voiced to himself hundreds of times since night of his capture. What if he hadn’t run perimeter? What if comms had stayed up and they’d been able to coordinate? What if some other member had been taken in his place?

He batted the last away with an experienced skill. It was better him. The thought of chipper Lena, dutiful Angie or innocent little Hana in his position was not a pleasant one, and it left him in rare gratitude to his circumstance that it was he and not another, who had found themselves in such a position.

He was dragged reluctantly back to reality by the tangled moans of the body loomed above his and a telling quivering bulge in the member rammed nearly halfway down to the insides of his stomach. He frantically yearned against the hold, but his muscles, energy sapped from their previous exertion, were lifeless, and Reaper’s grip cold steel, the edged nails forcing Jack’s head to bury fully into their crotch, his airways blocked completely to the obstruction of the entire length of member forced through.

It leapt against his tongue, the slight movement on Jack’s part seeming to throw his jailer to the edge as he came with a bestial howl, the explosion of warmth splattering the insides of his throat, the member remaining in its place until the ground grew eerily unsteady underneath Jack’s sleepy limbs, his mind dizzy as near to blackout, he desperately forced the swallow, gagging as the salted slop ran down his tract.

Reaper gave a pleased hum of approval and suddenly Jack’s mouth was free – gloriously free – as the appendage withdrew, pushed out past his protesting teeth and purpled, roughened lips. Void of all support, his form toppled to the stone, enveloped in chilled embrace, other than the tremors wrenched from his chest, his figure remaining stilled, boneless in its splayed position against the ground. 

 ** _“Wasn’t that nice?”_** Reaper dripped in condescending contempt as he addressed his brokenly quivering conquest.

Jack shuffled his head in a barely mustered half nod as he was lifted and dragged across to be, in some cruel joke, placed reverently back onto the gurney surface.

“ ** _And what do we say to nice things?”_** He could hear the victorious smirk behind the words.

“T-t-thank you.” Self-loathing welled as he stuttered out wobblingly to the clink of brass as the straps fell back to place, laced again in their iron hold across his form. He heaved, numbly registering his resumed paralysis, the image of Reaper blurring as the expressionless mask appeared to linger on his face, and then mercifully, darkness swooped in and unconsciousness claimed him.


	5. Reluctantly Dancing With the Devil

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> McHanzo shipping moments, because something needs to balance out the extremely unhealthy relationship and lighten the dark shit that is coming.
> 
> A short chapter in rare occurrence that doesn't suggest the writer is a total monster. In other news, Gangster's Paradise chapter 2 will be coming shortly

“The good doctor says and I agree that those are bad for your health. Nearly 135,000 Americans die of lung cancer each year.”

Jesse snorted humorlessly as he rolled the fattened, smouldering cigar between his fingers. “So, you finally discovered Google. Well congratulations sugar,” He angrily chucked the tube to the street below, tilting his head slightly to briefly eye the newcomer. He had been expecting Tracer, even Angie or Winston. But definitely not the broadened, half exposed chest of the usually stone cold bowman. He chucked at the man's flimsily clad garb, wondering as he pulled his own crimsoned horse blanket closer to his shoulders how Hanzo could possibly withstand the bitter bite of chilled open air. “You’re only about two decades too late.”

“You are…sad?” The Shimada ventured doubtfully as he fell behind the slumped form of McCree, his staple hat rested to his side to expose the russet locks usually so religiously obscured, the cowboy’s manner unusually dejected as his legs swung in dulled dead thuds against the backs of stone wall from his unhappy perch on the edge of rooftop, his figure a poorly shaded silhouette against the deepened navy skyline backdrop.

“Course I am.” Jesse’s sobered gruff response came after a stagnant pause. “76 is out there somewhere, probably half, if not all by now, dead, and we done fuck all to help him.”

“Focus on the mission and not the possible death of a stray.” Hanzo’s steps were silent as he padded over to the stricken agent. “He is alive. Talon would not let his death go without a public humiliation.”

“Uh, thanks, I think.” Jesse growled sourly as he lit another cigar and raised it in stilted motion to his mouth, clamping the end angrily between his teeth and exhaling in a lengthened strict drag.

Hanzo sighed gently as he stooped; form bending to half as he elegantly dropped to mirror the westerner’s stance. “You feel guilt for his situation.” The stoic man confirmed as his eyes wrenched uneasily across the street layout below, hawk like in his search of the clustered crates and darkened dumpsters lining the alleys’ sides. It would be a stain on both their honour if caught in an ambush for the second time in the shortened span of eight days.

“He was alone. And we all thought it was congratulations, job done.” Jesse left the cigar balanced precariously between his lips to rake a nervous hand through the ends of his greased ratty mop. “I was discussin’ buyin booze when he was getting the life slapped outta him.”

“You should not feel guilt.” His companion stated stiffly, as if uncomfortable to be discussing the topic. “The attack was not as consequence of your direct fault. We all lost vision, and caution. And we all paid for that loss.”

“But what I can feel guilt bout is that we’re just sittin here yackin’, instead of busting his ass outta jail.” Jesse sighed. “What does an emotionless man know of guilt anyway?”

Hanzo remained silent and for a moment Jesse worried he’d irreversibly crossed a line. It was hard to tell with the stern Japanese exactly where to cut losses without being subjected to a week of stilted silent treatment or arrow rapidly notched and aimed to the face.

“I killed my brother.” Hanzo eventually murmured in an unexpected breach of quiet. “The heavy mantle of guilt is one I know well.”

Jesse started, nearly falling off the edge as the speech filtered through his consciousness. The raw emotion displayed - for the bowman the suggested ripple in tone may as well have been a total breakdown complete with bucketed tears and wailed sobs, equally as surprising as the admittance of Genji as family. His eyes slanted to the sides to better observe his partner, the hardened edges of guilt ridden frown softening. “He’d probably forgive you, you know.”

“Yes, I do know.  Genji was always…soft. Too _nice_ to hold the Shimada line.” Hanzo growled _nice_ as if the word had cornered him, beaten him black and blue then mugged him in one of the darkened alleys they were perched loftily above. “He would forgive me, but that does not mean my actions were forgivable.”

“He just wants his brother back.”

“He cannot return.” The tone was surprisingly mournful for its speaker and Jesse suddenly found the urge within himself to turn and embrace his companion in a burly bear hug, burying his face into the man’s swanned neck. He ignored it – that would get an arrow aimed to the face and a month of stark ignoring if anything ever would.

“Well uh, thanks for the pep talk, sugar. I think it really helped-“ Jesse turned to properly thank the man, but found the stretch of rooftop empty. Hanzo had gone, returning him to his isolation.

He groaned as he pulled himself to his feet, shoving his hat to his head in fluid motion and dropped to the street, second cigar still clenched in his canines, drawing Peacekeeper at the nearby outbreak of fire. “Darn ninja man and his Batman disappearing shit. Doesn’t ever stay to say goodbye.”

* * *

 

Lena was locked in combat with Reaper. It was a position none of the team ever wished to be in, but of them all, with her chronal accelerator and ability to literally jump time (to certain extent) she stood the best chance of anyone assembled in taking the monster down. Furthermore she wouldn't lie, right now she possessed a particular vindictive urge to violently maim the man as worst as possible, her usually chipper upbeat replaced by a roaring spitfire of rage at the thought of what the current reluctant dance partner might have done to a man she respected, looked up to, laughed and shared conversation with in the base hallways.

Similarly to the night in London, comms had stuttered then downed completely and the entire team had found themselves isolated in loaded silence once more. Following the eruption of violent screeched bullets, Lena had broken from the planned course, doggedly followed the sound, burst from one gash alley and mid charge come to lock to a dance with a monster who could possibly be classed as the devil himself.

The symphony of wailed ammo continued, rising in arching echo over Lena’s raggedly panted breaths as she fought to keep her burning protesting muscles going. “Where’s Soldier? What have you done with my teammate?” She howled, materialising to Reaper’s back and firing a hasty volley of fire, wearily directed to between his shoulder blades.

Her stamina was fading fast and in comparison the opponent looked almost casual as they filled the dimly-lit space, shaded skeleton thrown to a poor light by the ghosted orb hung between rolled mist overhead. The sombre branches of streetlamp had stood no chance beneath the unforgiving barrage that the dancers kept frenzied rhythm to. 

The wraith chuckled and descended into a thickened smog, slipping to join the shadows pooled at her feet before any bullet could stick. “ **What haven’t I done with him?** ” He purred in her ear and returned ammunition, fingers sliding over the spines of guns as they discarded the bodies to swiftly conjure two replacements, just as quickly fired as they were pulled. Lena jumped in space hurriedly to the side to avoid the sudden heavy rain of shrapnel, form cast to a soft blue as it reappeared a metre from the streamed line of bullet. “ **I bet you don’t even know who Golden Boy really is underneath that helmet**.”   

Lena paled at that. The identity of Soldier76 had been one hidden from the entire team. The agent had been painstakingly careful that no member ever caught him without the helm securely glued to his expression. She wasn’t sure if even Winston knew the previous vigilante’s identity. But now Reaper, and consequently the entirety of Talon, knew the man beneath the mask. “GIVE HIM BACK!” she roared, bristling in boiled fury, a newfound shoot of energy spurred by the rage, muscles forgoing their tired aches as she blipped in existence, materialising after a beat to Reaper’s immediate left, poised in a high jump in the air, a roundhouse aimed to his side.

“ **Oh I won’t be doing that.”** She yelped as her leg phased through the targeted form, her body following suit to fall brokenly to the hardened sting of concrete, landing jarringly on a leg, the ankle unable to take the sudden weight pushed to it, twisting to an awkward angle, a pained mewl passing through her clenched teeth. **“Not yet, at least. But you’ll see him again I promise, when he’s learned to heel properly.** ”

Lena froze in her crusade, rage temporarily forgotten, face blanching a pale sickened grey at the implications of the promise. Talon were going to repurpose her missing comrade, turn him into an emotionless puppet, just as they had with Amelie.

“ **I would love to stay and continue this little chat,** ” She quivered in indignation, realising with sickening epiphany that her entire best efforts to survive had meant nothing to his part. The entire time he had been toying with her, indulging her anger like a parent to their petulant child in order to soothe a thrown tantrum. “ **But I have a sick puppy to kick. Give the ape my kindest regards.”**

She blinked in confusion. “What are you talki-“ She stammeringly warbled in beginning, but was cut abruptly off as tendrils wrenched her weapons from grasp, flinging them in childish discard to an out of reach corner. She felt the harsh connection of solid to the back of her skull and she crumpled to the street, the world and Reaper’s smoking form sliding away.


	6. Losing It

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> 10 days of imprisonment does things to a guy.

Jack figured out his behaviour was being conditioned on the eve of his tenth night. Well, tenth if he could trust his captor, and just the use of trust and Reaper thrown to the same sentence had him severely questioning his sanity. He’d croaked the question out, not expecting an answer. Even more shocked to find the length of time passed. Ten days. Military training – lengthy though it may have been, could only go so far. Jack was painfully aware of it. He was cracking. Personality and person splintering away, the spider line rift cleaving at their unravelling seams a little further with each hour spent aware.

He curled his legs to his chest in the pitiful hunkered cower. A week and a half passed in near complete dehumanization, forced each night to the dogbowl, and when the contents of that had emptied – the precious ambrosia always disappearing far too quickly for his burnt throat’s need – impaled by Reaper’s cock and made to swallow seed. Worse, the demon now expected Jack’s active participation in his pleasuring – claws tearing ribbons to Jack’s flesh if he didn’t play his part to his jailer’s satisfaction. Jack himself took no joy in knowing he was now highly proficient in giving fellatio, that his tongue now knew Reaper’s manhood as intimately as its owner did.

The only happiness had come when he’d been freed from that table, cut from the straps that had snapped his wings, saved from paralysis and allowed at last, some movement in his cage. Though that jubilation was short lived; had fled at the sight of the cuffs sunken to his wrists and ankles. The manacles were too solid to break against the walls even if he could muster the strength for a slam, an equally fragile line of clasped rings linking each of the left to right, allowing Jack freedom in stretched height but sternly preventing any extended width outside of body span.

He’d practised, experimenting at first with light kicks aimed at imaginary Reaper faces before moving on to full stretches, slowly regaining control of muscle. He could even manage a crawl now, although the agonised pace still held all the elegance of a flailing fish pulled from its element, flopping uselessly in its place, left to dry on the sidewalk.

Maybe the demon had thought him finally broken, or maybe it was because both of them knew he had nowhere to go. Make it through the door and then what? Trail the corridors until he ran into the hundreds of armed agents, all of whom painted a target to his back, to be dragged to his place, lick his wounds and await whatever punishment was to be doled out from pushing his luck that hundredth mile too far? His thoughts of escape had dwindled at that certain epiphany, but returned with a fiercened vengeance as he realised Reaper was training him to some sort of sick pet.

Well he wouldn’t sit here and docilely wait for his mind to be turned into the monster’s personal playground. He’d seen Amelie. Had talked to her after the conferences, paused to politely greet and exchange pleasantries in the corridor when they'd brushed each other. He'd respected the wife of the deceased Gérard. He’d seen the marionette they’d turned the proud woman to.

He had to escape before their strings irreversibly snagged his limbs. He was yet to see a single labcoat, yet for them to start poking needles and prodding round his brain. But it was coming. He knew it was. Didn't know why it hadn't happened yet - he'd been expecting to see the harsh brunt of spotless clinical spot _light_ with each awakening - but it hadn't. For that at least, he was glad. It meant he was still Jack Morrison. Maybe a slightly _definitely_  deranged version of the man he had been before the birdcage and clipped wings, but still Jack. Still his own presence. Still his own mind. No matter how mentally tarnished.

He had to escape, and if he was brutally honest, he didn't care if he died during the attempt. Even getting shot was preferable to another night spent sucking the bastard holding him here off.

Now was as good a time as any – Jack was freshly watered, freshly stained too – but he tried to ignore the lines of slick painted in crystalline drops to his puffed lips, and the growl of his stomach wasn’t as painfully obnoxious as it usually was. Reaper was gone, the bowl empty. The wraith had parted in the same way that always left Jack cowered to the corner in an attempt to meld his quivered form with the wall. Maybe if he pressed hard enough he might actually manage it one day. It was a laughable hope, one that he held onto with a manic fever and only confirmed the slip of his structured psyche.

There was loathing in his darkness. Mostly directed at his captor. Decapitation was today’s _plat du jour_. A sick joke that brought no smile to his face. Ironic way to go for the guy forcing him to give head each day. Seething rage for his jailer and jailhouse, but a lot of it was also self-inflictions. Jack had always been a perfectionist, even since before he’d been trained to reload a gun in 0.5 seconds and pop the trigger without hesitation. He was his worst critic, a poor reputation to hold when locked to your own ways for the best – worst – part of ten days. 

Ten days of self-hatred. Of cursing his weakness. His eagerness of falling to Reaper's feet and his greedily stuffing his fill of the dogbowl. 

In the earlier days - those days passed of drownings and asphyxiations - he still sometimes eyed that door as it opened, the sound of the clang offered from the other side – the side he was so unfairly forbidden to see – sparking a sputtered light that each time he had thought fully extinguished. And he would hold his breath and  _hope_ , and  _believe_ that the screen would be lifted and he would see his team, smiling, upbeat Lena and her infectious cut grin, her lithe form overshadowed by the hulking bulk of Winston’s ebony fuzz, Jesse and Hanzo, arguing at the sidelines like a drowned cat and kicked dog.

But they never did appear, and soon like ghosts passing into memory, they were gone from his. Names remained – he wouldn’t let them fade, whispering each beneath his breath like a dying corpse detailing his final words. But he could never get the right shade of chocolate to match Tracer’s spiked do, never properly match the slit nostrils of Winston’s muzzle to the beetle pupils hung above, how far would Jesse tower above his stoic sparring partner?  Names lived. Images stuttered. Pictures died. Details lost clarity, faces lost shapes.

And each time that wall to his front carved open it was to the same expressionless mask.  _Drowning. Asphyxiation. Dismemberment._  And each time he stared to the watery depths of the dogbowl he looked that little bit  **less**. Explosives _. Impalement. Giant electronic fan._ And each time Reaper would fill him with that much of an unwanted  **more**. Disembowelment _. Crucifixion. Electrocution._ He stopped holding his breath. He stopped watching the door.

_Decapitation._

_1, 2, 3…6…8, 9, 10_

He giggled as he counted each one out on his fingers, eyeing each raised to attention soldier with a sordid seriousness. The laughter that only he could hear buzzed in an angry echo to his ears. His tormentor had vanished. Leaving Jack to his developing madness, the howling jester of an abandoned court whose biggest punchline to offer was himself. 

_Fresh water drowned down with an aftertaste of salt._

He hated to go with the old film cliché of roll around and pretend to be ill until someone came in, but hey, if it worked, it worked. His mind imposed briefly; unwanted and unhelpful fillings of movie marathon nights hosted by McCree in the communal lounge, of being shoved despite protest into a sandwich between the (im)matured cowboy and his rival so as to prevent at least one gun-bow fight in the hopes of ensuring the survival of the latest couch for at least another day of the week. Too painful – struck by nauseous longing – he swallowed and discarded the image. Determination set. He tested the give in the shackles to his ankles. He’d return to the team, or die trying.

He writhed on the floor, hands clenching the sides of his stomach as he screeched, heaved rolls of insanity that echoed off the walls and rang through the corridor outside, half of it a show, half of it a  _release_.

The birdcage door opened. For the first time in a while, he watched it. And  **hoped**.


	7. Stranger Danger

The door opened.

It wasn’t his team.

But it wasn’t Reaper. Thank god it wasn’t Reaper.

He glanced the side of boots before he screwed his eyes shut in continuation of the play. He never thought he’d cry over shoes. But here he was, almost bawling his eyes out over a pair of military standards because they were navy, none-steel capped inks of darkness.

He could hear them, their banshee voices booming through his howls. Two of them. Arguing. Arguing over him. One of them almost kind, one of them angrily protesting. “Oh fuck! I don’t know what’s wrong with him!”

He could taste the panic in Kindness’s voice. They were genuinely terrified. In another situation he might have been provoked to leap up and declare the entire farce. As it was however, the involuntary bondage didn't have him in a particularly forthcoming mood. “Shit! Reaper’s gonna have our heads on a plate if the guy dies on our watch!”

“Well what are we going to do?” Anger sneers as a heel buries itself into Jack’s front. “Rub his tummy and kiss it better?”

Kindness sighs and Jack can tell he’s trying to assess the situation, hurryingly weighing his options. “We’ll take him to the med bay.”

“Oh suuuure,” Anger gripes sarcastically. “Let’s just unchain him while we’re at it, give him the run of the place.” A kick to Jack’s side sends him screaming for real. His verse becomes a duet as Kindness joins in to supply his own frightened yelp.

“Jesus do you want that monster on our back? We were told to keep him alive so we keep him alive," There's a grunt and Jack's beaten side is his own again. "Unless you want to be the one to tell the guy who murdered an entire room of agents because one ‘looked at him wrong’ that you let his favoured whore die?”

A conceding silence followed from Anger’s end, broken only by Jack’s screeches, more enraged than pained now. He blistered at the brand, hating that his identification to even Talon’s grunts was anything but prisoner.

Jack felt intruding hands slip beneath his form and he was none too gently hoisted up into a steadied grip. Footfalls on the tile followed the guided sway of his figure. They were moving.

Anger remembered his voice after a heartbeat, grumbling about ‘how he didn’t like it.’ Jack hadn’t liked his cell either thank you very much. But no one had been accommodating enough to change the scenery.  He wasn’t about to return the unanswered favour.

“Does he ever fucking shut up?” Anger snarled as the backs of Jack’s lids brightened, a glare at their edges that signalled the transition from shadow to artificial sun.

The deadened echo of slapped boots on concrete had risen to playful hiccups of pitch, ringing out in lengthened free stretch, stark contrast to the deadened thuds in the place of imprisoned confines.

They were through the door, in a corridor, probably headed to the med bay. Jack didn’t think. His mind snapped to auto as soon as he realised they were out of his birdcage.

His eyes snapped open, vision returned, screams cut off. He didn’t feel any guilt when he slammed his foot into Anger’s face, hearing the crunch of broken nose as the man crumpled. He felt the sting of needle for Kindness though, wondering as he rested the collapsed form to the side of obnoxiously lit corridor just how a man who showed compassion for war prisoners had ended up as a worker for such a villainous organisation.

Not that Jack was allowed much pause for thought. Apparently the universe had decided being demoted to Reaper’s cock warmer just wasn’t enough punishment for whatever batshit Jack had pulled in a previous lifetime – and it must have been something pretty serious, like planned genocide – because it decided to send him the gift of a wandering Talon agent.

The uniform clocked the haggard, shackled stranger barely standing above two familiar colleagues, both of which slumped unconscious, and yelled something into his shirt collar.

Apparently karma had also decided Jack still needed a left hook to the face because no sooner had the unintelligible string of vocabulary that Jack could easily guess translated to various swears and _holy shit the prisoner’s out's_ , then the grunt had reached to his belt and did something any sensible evil henchman would do in the scenario of finding two passed out staff and renowned dangerous escapee in the hall of their base. He pulled a gun, popping the trigger before Jack could properly remember how to command his body to get out of the way.

Jack looked briefly down, colouring when he remembered his lack of attire. Oh right. His entire worldly possessions were still reduced to boxers and a pair of metal cuffs. His embarrassment of the near nudity was almost enough to allow escape from the blossoming gash cratered to the side of his exposed belly button. Almost. Clothes or no, the searing heated agony was still pushed very much present to the front of his mind.

The uniform started towards him, still squealing into his collar in demand for backup. Survival instinct kicked in, and Jack turned tail, one shackled hand pressed to his side in a pitiful attempt to staunch the flow of blood as he hoofed it as fast as possible when shackled and wobbly as a newborn fawn, sensibly, in the opposite direction of the man with a gun.

Adrenaline surged, feeding like a drug through his system over the burn of muscle protest as he forced one leg in front of the other in some possessed, inelegantly rushed hobble.

His other hand clenched the corner of his skull as if hoping that by cradling the sphere steadily his surroundings would stop their sickening slide of spins. When that didn't work it fell to propelling his figure forward, pushing frantically off the bleach claustrophobic walls hemming him in.

He could hear his breath – each gasp pushed out over the roar of pain that had laid a chokehold on his senses. One ankle – unused to the stress of such exercise, lagged dully behind the other, the metal of its cage sinking clumsily against the bone.

His stamina was drying, the initial burst of adrenaline fading as his body remembered it hadn’t ingested a single solid for ten days. He didn’t look back as he fled; the shouts and pocks of bullets to the walls at his sides were enough to confirm his escort.

Thankfully no other bullets lodged themselves to his person. Apparently the average Talon grunt had the accuracy of a Stormtrooper. Jesse would have laughed at that joke, he thought hollowly as he stumbled a corner. But Jesse wasn’t here.

The bend had allowed him a temporary cover from his followers, giving him a short but deeply appreciated privacy. He glanced to the corridor, relief flooding at the sight of a break in the clinical landscape. 

He nearly fell over in his eagerness – or maybe that was the blood loss – as he pulled every ounce of strength to drag himself to the door, desperately tugging the handle, almost screaming in euphoria as it gave in his hand.

He quickly lifted the hand from his side, wincing as now unfettered, burgundy spewed from the crater, and slid it across the wall to the door's left, painting a trail of smeared scarlet print in the expanse of white to throw any suspicion from his route.

He staggered through the gap, slamming it behind him before lumbering over to the closest wall and throwing himself with a relieved small sigh against the screen. The happiness was short lived as it always seemed to be these days – his eyes freezing and form snapped rigid as a quick glance brought the discovery that he wasn’t as alone as first thought.

“Oh you  _loco_  son of a bitch.” If Reaper had raided a Halloween store than the female lazily reclined on a doubled bed in front of him had held up some kind of rave party. Complete with glow stick leggings. The first thing that struck him was the brightness. Holy hell, how had no one ever spotted that neon overcoat on missions? 

“You tried to escape, didn’t you, _el tonto_.” Purple tipped roots. Purple costume. Purple walls he was pressed to in what he guessed were her quarters. So he’d played hide and seek in her boudoir. He briefly wondered if she’d shoot him for the impromptu scarlet paint job he'd just done to the unsurprisingly predictable plum carpet.

“Shh,” She raised a finger to her lips conspiratorially. “I won’t tell if you don’t.” A thickly mascaraed soot lash batted in a dramatized wink.

“Why?” Jack gasped raggedly as he leaned to the wall, dripping more crimson across darkened heather. He stuttered, eying the woman and balancing his options. “Why are you doing this?” He could fight. Judging from the rattled howls battering round in the back of his skull that wouldn’t end too well on his end. Could probably pull a runner, but that would either throw him to the agent grunts outside or she would give chase. And both of them knew Jack was in no state to win that race.

Shadow-dripped lashes blinked owlishly in false innocence. “You look like you need help.”

Jack’s eyes narrowed in suspicion. “You don’t strike me as the helping type.” He slurred semi-coherently as his mind faltered, blood loss rearing its head in obnoxious reminder of presence.

She grinned like a cat about to catch a canary, lifting a manicured claw in hypnotising wafted arc as she tutted through popped lips. “Nor do you strike me as a leader, ex strike commander.”

Jack’s gut punched. He’d told. Of course he’d fucking told. Secret identities don’t remain secret when the mystery is captured in your enemy’s home base. He wondered as he fought to stay conscious – a task made increasingly harder by the amount of blood pumping out of his system in constant reminder of the bullet lodged into his torso – just how much of the world now knew Jack Morrison was alive.

The woman clicked her tongue dismissively, as if bored with the conversation partner currently bleeding out half the contents of his veins onto her carpet.  “Honestly,” She paused to stare through him in passing and he wondered just how rare that privilege of honesty was granted. “I just wanted to see the little  _perro callejero_ he finds so interesting.”

Jack didn’t know the term. Figured it was Spanish. It made sense – her voice was thickened with Mexican root. He also guessed from the honeyed tone it was purred in that he probably shouldn't want to know the meaning.

Ever one to defy what he shouldn't do, he stored it in the back of his addled mind, one thing to return to, crack open a dictionary when he made it out, pour over its pages in the Watchpoint’s library and decide then just how enraged he should be.

“I’m not a little pero cally hairo.” He tried to imitate the silken sounds that had slipped from her tongue so easily but the syllables were clunky and unnatural in his unpractised mouth.

She glared, affronted at his butchering of her native tongue. “No, well I suppose you’re right. In a few moments it’ll be a  _perro callejero muerto_.”

Jack paled. No dictionary needed to translate that meaning. Dead. Jack supposed he was. If not from the swarm of agents noisily making their way past the pair outside then to his captor. Jack didn’t know why Reaper apparently found him ‘so interesting’, but he doubted simple interest would stay the ghost's hand from lodging a bullet in between his runaway prisoner's eyes.

“So, what’ll it be gramps?" She smirked, a thinned tongue pausing to chase drawn neon purple. "Duck pillows or bloodied granite?”

Death or stranger danger? Halloween store or neon lights raid? Fuck it, Jack decided. He nodded and stumbled closer to the woman. Knowing that when he woke up he’d probably be regretting another life decision. If he didn’t wake up to the insides of polished knot wood.

He probably shouldn't have looked at her face as he toppled. The triumphant predatory grin that had carved her lips split was almost worse than the emotionless bleached plain of mask.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Translations:  
> loco - crazy  
> el tonto - fool  
> perro callejero - stray/street dog  
> perro callejero muerto - dead street dog


	8. The Calm Before the Sombra

“I’m not dead.” He slurred unintelligently, the words dropped into the silent air like dead weight. His burning eyes were greeted by blurred plum sky. He blinked away confusion; this wasn’t his cell, wasn’t his prison, his mind sleepily mumbled through the murky sludge that had him stuck in its grasp, coherent sense dragged through sodden mud.

“No, you’re not. Almost were though, silly little _tonto_.” The voice – feminine, youthful, _Mexican? –_ teased somewhere from at his front. He tried to sit up, but gave that off almost instantly, hissing as the effort provoked an unexpected ripple of loudly screeched agony to his sides. His breath rattled as he limply attempted to lift an arm, managing to raise it about an inch off the warmth itch of surface before the limb collapsed.

Spanish. How long had it been since he’d heard Spanish? Not since those nights. Late nights spent shuffled into another for warmth; gentle calloused fingers carded through caramel licks, puffs of hot air as breath mingled deliciously to the ring of his ear lobe. _Te amo._ A hand slipped gently down his shirt, softly racing beneath weakly clasped buttons and plucking over raised nubs. _Te adoro._ A front pressed into his back, the broadened chest behind him cleft with lines of power. _Mi media naranjar_ _…_

 _“_ Ga-be?” His voice cracked, his throat too dry for smoothness – the name usually a reverent whisper pushed out to ragged haggard breaths a harsh half-broken whimper.

“Quit with the delusions and go back to sleep _perro_ , how else will you keep those youthful looks?” He grunted and happily gave in to the siren call of darkness that rushed up to meet him as if in obedience to the unknown voice’s command, allowing his body to dip gently back into the abyss it had plunged reluctantly out from.

The second time he woke, vaguely aware, to a hand pressing over his stomach. He lay in the swathe of satin that itched into his skin, taking stock of events momentarily – capture, escape, capture(?) – before his drooped lashes fluttered in slight parting, cracked ajar slits of pupils greeted to purple polish nails clumsily stretching cotton to his lower, past rolls of the things discarded to the woman’s side, their beige pallor marred a bloodied rust.  It wasn’t the practiced expert skill he had grown accustomed to back at the Watchpoint, but there was still a slight air of experience to the deft fingers in their applications.

As if reading his mind, lines of concentration parted as she grinned lazily past purple lips. “This line of work, you get good at this sort of thing.” The hand withdrew to peel another scrap off the roll. “Course we wouldn’t need to if we got a fucking healer but noooo," she snarled. "Gotta rely on medpacks and dodging bullets.”

He stared at her as she flew into animated tirade, eyes slipping, vision wearily fading. He guessed the issue was a particularly sore one. It would have been almost funny to listen to the enemy agent rant indignantly about the difficulty of dodging bullets, the mistreatment of firing a weapon towards her face, if he weren’t here, on her bed, stuck to bloodstain soaked scarlet sheets that had been dyed with his life-force, and still, to his dismay and shame, very much naked and shackled.

He watched her through his falling lashes with caution, unsure exactly what to make of his, his what? Friend? Acquaintance? Saviour?  Logic told him she was none of the above – Talon agents weren’t friends or rescuers, especially not those high up enough in the ranks to be entitled to their own private quarters. The one to his front was just an enemy who so far hadn’t pulled a gun to his head. A rare character trait which earned her a sliver of gratitude on his part but zero trust.

She paused, glowering as if annoyed at his lack of participation in conversation. “You going to just sit there and stare like some dumb animal or you going to answer me?”

His mind decided for him, the pressing need to just lie down and _sleep_ insatiable as the room darkened, the clarity of her face swimming into distorted fuzz before even that disappeared completely.

The third time he awoke with a start; body leaping forward only to fall immediately back as if struck, joints feeling as if they’d just been fried by five hundred volts of electricity as his back sank numbly into the embrace of mattress and coiled spring lain beneath.

“Welcome back to the land of the living, commander.” She was hovered to his right, impossibly tall from his reclined position. She said the rank as she said the Spanish _perro_ – with a condescending bluntness that left him knowing the title addressed harboured no respect, a taunted slur to his person rather than an honour pinned to his garb.

“Brought you something you might appreciate.” She moved to lift something up from the ground, head bobbing down then springing back up, hands upon return to his sight quickly pushing a bowl into the space between his half-opened legs, the liquid calmed and crystalline. His eyes lustily followed the movement.

He snapped his head down and was snuffling at it instantly, pressing his tongue as far as the appendage could rip from its anchored place, scraping the bland sting of tasteless china bottom with each greedily choked down flow of stream. She laughed from off his side, the jarring cackle instantly snapping him from the trance.

“So he already taught the _perro_ some tricks.”

He coloured under the brow critically raised above dancing humoured eyes, his face flamed lobster as he brokenly pushed fingers to the bowl’s sides, the unsteady grip rising in its tremors as he lifted it above his chest and poured its insides through his lips.

He lurched off the bed after drowning the entire contents, staggering his way drunkenly on uncooperative legs to the fogged door off the side to enter the lair of char tile and buzz of electric fan light. The glory of an ensuite. He figured it could have been anything, from the lavish insides of one found in a palace to a cramped train cubicle and he would still have been brought near to tears for the relieving lack of musky granite slab corners.

He threw himself to the floor to a horrendous crack, corners of kneecaps smashing into the tile, bent his form to half and retched into the bowl. Not much came out. An opaque thinned line of slobber that trailed inelegantly from his chin to the ceramic.

He tore his head away and curled his shivering legs to his wrenching chest, lying in a clenched, shuddering ball, only semi-aware; already half gone when she entered, barely feeling the fingers on his collar bone as they dragged him back to the mattress and threw him to its suffocating cocoon of covers.

She would leave at times, sometimes when he was aware, others when he was drowned in the darkened tendrils that held his head down in forced slumber, but always locking the door with a brief wave of illuminated glove. Sometimes he would lie there and watch the frame through lidded eyes before allowing his mind to make the slip to unconsciousness, wondering whether she was locking whatever was outside out or keeping what was trapped inside in.

When she’d return she would feed him – mashed potatoes first so that he might keep the food locked inside his stomach, then after three servings successfully kept down, pureed apple. It tasted like cardboard and was even worse in texture; slop-like goop when it hit his tongue but he was grateful for the part solids.

She’d watch him eat, laughing whenever he choked on impatience or dropped the spoon through stuttering reluctant fingers into the bowl to land in the puddled slime. She’d smile whenever he did, that same carved grin ripped straight from the muzzle of a Cheshire feline – calling him _perro_ or _tonto._

On occasion she’d talk to him of the world. Of her missions through the globe – London, Nepal, Dorado. How many they’d killed, what they’d stolen, the cause of the latest of Reaper’s temper tantrums. Some of them were missed hits or kills gone wrong, but most of them were Jack. The wraith had been pissed at the least when he’d returned from duty to find the bird sprung from its cage. Apparently Anger and Kindness weren’t so emotional now. Neither was the guy who’d shot Jack.

Part of him revolted when one return she gleefully described how his jailer had shot the man and left him on the slab table Jack had escaped from to bleed out, alone and in darkness. Another part felt a vindictive surge of triumph.

Sometimes she’d teasingly feed him a detail about his team; how Tracer wasn’t smiling so much so more, how each engaged combat was always accompanied by a howled interrogation, how the comm lines were always taut with silenced tension, void of any shouts in competition to be heard before she cut them down.

She had his name, as did the entirety of Talon’s operations. He didn’t hold hers. Sombra was all she gave him; a calling card of marketed identity handed with the type of laugh he’d grown to expect but somehow always managed anyway to leave him feeling like some test subject strapped to a lab table as above his head scientist’s poked needles through his flesh.

He knew he wasn’t free. The walls that closed in on him differed in colour, but they were still a prison. She wouldn’t let him escape, she had her own agenda. He was just something on the side she found interesting.

She reminded him in a lot of ways like that of his previous jailer. The interest, the arrogance. But at least here he could see behind the mask, could distinguish curved grins for smirked arrogance and snarled canines for fury. It was harder to predict mood, to know when the right time to stop and shut up was when only going by speed of twitched shoulders and volume of cast steps.

The next time he opened his eyes she was at the foot of the bed, arms crossed to her chest and pointedly watching him like a wolf eying a sacrificial lamb. He flushed under the scrutiny and pointed weakly to his exposed body, more aware than ever of his vulnerability.

“Yes I know,” She snapped. “But you’re not my size and I’m not sneaking into Reap’s room to raid his dressup closet.” She wrinkled her nose, exaggerating a gag as one hand waved over a nostril. “How long has it been since you washed?”

“Ten days. I think. ” He added after a shrug. “Lost track of the time.”

She rolled her eyes and exasperatedly puffed air from her swollen cheeks. “No wonder you smell like a corpse.”

“Gee sorry," he ground sarcastically.  "I just couldn’t find the complimentary shampoo bottles anywhere.”

“Fiery. I can see why he likes you.” She threw her head back and laughed before her eyes thinned to their usual critical narrowed slits. “There’s a shower in the bathroom, think you can use it or do you need me to hold your hand and wash your back?”

“I can manage fine.” He growled.

She thumbed in the direction of the door. “It’s all yours, towels are in the corner. I won’t peek, promise.”

He didn’t stay to confirm the promise – practically ripped his boxers from his hips in his eagerness to enter the glass cubicle. He hissed in pain and pleasure as he turned the dials, the head spluttering into life, freshly created waterfall slamming into opened gashes to the pain of a million knife wound nicks cleft shallowly into his tissue.

The salt sting of tears tracking down his face mingled together with the warm blast of pelted drops, his shackled hands raking violently through his hair, the corpse of a plastic bottle thrown to the corner to join its fallen comrades – entire contents rubbed to a soapy lather, the liquid frothing to sea foam bubbles as it chased down his bangs and gathered at the sides of the drain.

Using up all the shampoo and gels was hardly a fitting revenge for all the jabs of _perro_ and _tonto_ he had endured – he didn’t know what they meant but from the tone employed they couldn't possibly be anything complimentary – but it felt good to at least rank one small act of defiance against his latest jailer.

He scrubbed his body with scented substances fiercely, scouring lemon and lime flavour till flesh reddened and broke to welts which swelled and burst, staining spurts of crimson beneath his cracked rag nails and clouding the translucent ghost silver caressing his figure.

He sighed in contentment, breathing deeply as he basked in the lack of muck smeared to his skin. He towelled off, somehow managing despite the continued weighted metals snapped to his wrists and ankles.

Body dry, he bent to pick the discarded boxers and retched, dropping them back instantly. She hadn’t been exaggerating on the stench. There was no way he’d be able to wear them, painful though it would be; he’d have to ask Sombra to borrow something, even if it meant squeezing into something two times sizes too small.

He staggered back into the adjoining room, already blushing as he rolled the words over in practice in his mind, the towel steered tightly to his hips in order to retain some dignity. His eyes leapt to the bed, confusion brewing as the gaze found emptied thrown aside plum sheets.

“See?” Sombra purred from her new vantage; her body moved from its perch on the bed to lean beside the opened gash of wall, the flood of light streamed from the corridor almost entirely blotted by the hulking shadow loomed to take up the entire frame space. Jack’s heart plummetted as his eyes found expressionless void slits. “I got him all dolled up, just for you.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> te amo - I love you  
> te adoro - I adore you  
> Mi media naranjar - a direct translation of 'my half an orange' but a term used in endearment that translates to 'my better half' or 'my soulmate'


	9. Of Pain & Punishment

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> What happens when an insomniac, three bottles of cider, a bag of jellybeans and a laptop are locked in a room together.
> 
> WARNING NON CON

Jack figured he was dead when Reaper stalked into the room. He’d already begun the opening scrawls of his will when the monster grabbed his waist before his feet could remember how to run and was just deciding how to dole out his inheritance to the team – trigger happy Jesse could have his rifle, Lena any desired novel off his dust-licked shelf, Winston his/ – when he was hoisted onto sooty shoulders.

The move dislodged the towel tactically clutched to Jack’s hips and his naked ass was inelegantly thrown into the side of Reaper’s covered cheek. He screeched, kicking and struggling uselessly against the steel-trap hold.

His disgruntled yells demanding to be put down were resolutely ignored as the demon turned angrily on his heels and stormily marched out the door, wordlessly barging past the female guffawing between her fingers at the sight of Jack’s total humiliation.

“Play nicely with the doggy now!” Sombra roared with laughter, the manic giggles only rising in volume as she met Jack’s furious gaze, a hand wiggling above her shoulder in a playful flippant wave goodbye, the mirthful audience taking full delight in the downright murderous glare that if looks could kill she’d be incinerated on the spot, drilling into her dancing pupils.

Jack froze in indignation, momentarily forgetting his anger at the traitor as she cheerily blew him a kiss, as if bidding a friend farewell to their home after a chance meeting, rather than sending them off to their funeral. Because from how pissed Reaper was, it wasn’t a question of if Jack would die, it was a question of _how much it would hurt_.

If Jack was murderous then the guy holding him was _genocidal._ The wraith’s breaths, normally silently evened and calmed even when provoked, were audibly fumed hisses violently spat from obscured lips.

Jack felt the enraged twitch of form beneath his squirming front, each demonstrated shudder of rage below him violently pronounced and ground harshly into his torso.

With a growl of vindictiveness, his shackled fists paused their weak assault against the cloaked back to flip a finger up in his own parting farewell, returning their attack as the female fled from his sight, her echoing taunted laugh still hauntingly following them down the corridors.

He slammed his head up and down into the edges of shoulder, his feet attempting to find purchase in kicks directed to his captor’s stomach. His efforts did little to deter the monster, if anything they only worsened his situation; the struggling thrashes provoking Reaper’s arm to lock in place securely over Jack’s back.

He yelped in exclamation as the other hand raised across his flailing legs, fingers violently slapping one side of bared butt cheek.

He blinked but stilled at the spank, blistering in shame at the hand remaining, pressed firmly to his ass, icy gloved fingers splayed across the surface in reminder as corridor walls blurred past.

His breath hitched as they turned a corner and came to the door he had worked so hard to escape, his eyes screwing and body stiffening in expectation of the approaching connection with concrete, only for lids to open again, blinking in surprise and confusion as they sped past the painfully familiar frame.

The Talon agents they passed wisely held their words and hurried along, some skidding to a stop and turning to rush off in the other direction upon first spotting the pair. The bravest or most suicidal of them briefly stared at Jack with sympathy, others daring enough – probably those who’d known the people on the other side of Jack’s rifle – smirked at him with triumphant hatred, as if this punishment was his much deserved comeuppance.

Soon they’d passed into a section of the corridor maze that was almost totally abandoned; the usual stream of agents rushing past as if their lives depended on it – and Jack supposed they did, he doubted Reaper would stop short of simply shooting any annoyance encountered if pushed far enough – petering out before dying completely.

He wondered numbly where they were going. If it was finally time for his visit to the long awaited labcoats or if they’d prepared a firing squad in the yard outside. At least that way he’d finally be able to see the sun again, even if it was seconds before his existence ended. Or maybe Reaper would just put a bullet in between his eyes and leave his body abandoned to rot in some broom cupboard out of spite.

The harshness of clinical light receded to an almost bearable dulled spotlight as they entered what Jack could only guess was the VIP exclusives only area. Maybe Sombra had had a hand in decoration because the whitewashed walls were now dripped a royal plum purple, the doors they passed frosted glass with combination codes for handles.

It reminded him more of some overpriced hotel reception than some evil base of operations. He swore he could even hear the dulcet tones of piano demurely playing Chopin’s _Nocturne_ from behind one closed screen.

They continued until they didn’t; Reaper pausing at a glassed panel as the hand on Jack’s ass mercifully fell away to key in digits, though the fingers atop the raised ridge of Jack’s spine remained.

The door slid open and Jack reluctantly followed his jailer’s entrance, his neck craning and head twisting as far as able in order to gather the location he had been dragged to.

His stomach dropped as if it had been pushed from the heights of a skyscraper as it became very clear exactly where they were. Reaper’s personal quarters. Who else but the Supreme Edgelord himself would have the place furnished in 21st century funeral director’s?

While the four poster bed - a majestic carvery of sleek oak and pitch sheets that boasted elegence -  at the room’s centre demanded attention and left the setting incredibly lavish, the place was devoid of colour to an almost painful degree.

Shadows pooled, barely distinguishable from the sooty carpet, faded silhouettes running along the lower edges of closets and cabinets, the polished washed wood so darkened it may as well have been a perfect match to the sable faces they lined.  

He hissed as he was clumsily dropped to the bed, scrabbling backwards into the swathe of covers that may as well have been the midnight sky upon release and leaping for any protection possible, his options sadly limited to a raven pillow.

He shook, quivering like a leaf as he determinedly clutched the cushion to his front like a lifesaver, but the wraith snatched it from him easily, wrenching the flimsy thing from his curled fingers and tossing it fiercely to the corner.

His tormentor chuckled deviously before clambering over the bed’s top, a hand snapping to Jack’s front and forcing him further down into the satin.

Jack’s terror escalated as Reaper easily mounted him, realisation dawning that what was happening would be a thousand times over worse than the pain any bullet or instrument of torture could ever inflict.

He desperately bucked against the weight but found no movement; pinned entirely in place by the body suddenly loomed over him. His hands pushed at the man’s chest but he showed no affect and refused to budge.

He frantically kneed Reaper in the stomach. The monster hissed in pain but stayed in position and Jack screeched as a hand snapped his face to the side, gasping for breath as his cheek angrily stung.  

When it became clear that this really was happening and he was helpless to stop it he screwed his eyes, limbs locking up in a frozen fearful statue. He wheezed out a whimper at the horrific sound of a zip peeling down.

There was no preparation, no warning, the intrusion was sudden, unexpected and oh so unwanted. Jack howled as his entrance was invaded, the unprepared hole tearing to accommodate the mass that had cruelly barged its way in, the inner sides of his thighs dampening with crimson slick as the thrusts continued.

They were nothing like those in previous experiences; none were gentle nor contained any semblance of care, it was not a beautiful rhythm set to the two participants’ preferences, but each one-sided, an explosion of despair rather than expression of love felt for the other, rudely barrelling through his insides and ripping both his body and mind apart at the seams he had so struggled to hold together since his capture.

This was no  embrace, no passionate tango in confirmation of feeling. No face playfully nuzzled into the side of his neck, no fingers lovingly tore through his hair and he knew if he dared to open his eyes he would not be met by a softened caramel glow but by harsh void craters.

Each jerked shove was done to almost complete silence, the grim atmosphere disturbed only by Jack’s sobbed whimpers and Reaper’s shortened grunts.

Jack’s voice rose involuntarily in pitch as one thrust found his prostate, pleasure temporarily exploding to the backs of his lids and bringing with it unwanted resurgences of murmured Spanish that he loathed to remember now, refusing to tarnish such worshipped images with the monstrosity he was at the mercy of now.

But thankfully the next and those that followed were a return to the abuse, his assaulter actively avoiding the bundle of nerves that had now been placed, allowing the reverent past addresses to slip from recollections to Jack's eternal gratitude.

His torment continued, humiliation spiralling to a climax as with a thunderous howl Reaper came, Jack’s mind empty as he felt warmth fill his lower. Opaque ooze puddled, leaking from the ripped gap to join the crimson stained sheets.

He didn’t care when Reaper eventually pulled out of his desecrated body, didn’t respond when the wraith threw him roughly from the bed and didn’t move from where he’d landed.

He didn’t bother to lift his head from the embrace of softened fuzz carpet as his eyes hollowly stared through the distance in front, numbly registering the shift from illuminated scene to sudden onslaught of shadow as the light above him snapped off.


	10. Shocking Developments

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So, listen, this ends the pattern of updates every day - getting chapters out that regularly is leaving me passing out, or as I like to put it, involuntarily falling asleep on my laptop. 
> 
> But before you band together to form a mob complete with pitchforks and torches in the style of every half decent rioting mass and chase me out of town, this will be getting regular updates, just one every second day at the regular time of 3pm PST

Jack emerged to consciousness to the feel of hands running over his chest. He blinked sluggishly, swallowing thickly as the fingers moved from his front to slip down his sides, dipping beneath his lower and lifting him with a gentleness that suggested their owner hadn’t held down and fucked Jack senseless against his will last night.

The awareness was unwanted; he desperately ached to crawl back into the safe embrace of darkness, close his eyes and never open them again. He had no wish no face anyone, let alone Reaper, in his reaching of rock bottom; his body still steeped in filth and to his continued humiliation, totally exposed; his boxers and towel probably long thrown to some incinerator.

At one point he would probably have struggled or mouthed off some taunt but he remained silent, no energy left to care or fight as he was hoisted and laid against a broad wispy chest. His mind was as broken as his battered and bruised body.

His head was rested against the side of Reaper’s bicep, his feet dangled uselessly into the wraith’s lower sides. It was almost laughable, being carried bridle style by your fucking rapist.

A slight, almost imperceptible tilt of his head led his eyes to meet the hollowed mask. The expressionless features may as well have been his own reflection, the blank slate sketched across the bleaching an exact mirror to his own empty portrait.

His eyes woodenly chased the line of illuminated panels as he was carried, through the corridors, _left, right, left, left, right._ He remained still, not caring for the change of silence to low hiss of automatic door as metal panels slid to allow passage and the lights dimmed, entered into a small metal box that lurched in beginning of descent, creaking to a stop and throwing Jack’s mind to an empty lurch as the contraption ended and they exited.

The lab was everything he had expected; cold, clinical and about as humane as the people who worked in the whitewashed walls. He brokenly noted the burst of animation their entrance brought; whitecoats and clipboards hurriedly speeding to a variety of nasty-looking machinery, each block of grey skewered with wires and decked in long boards of angry buttons that were twiddled and flicked in the descended frenzy.

Machine wires were wrenched out of their places, cables unravelled and draped across the polished bland tiles to run in fluid strips to the focus of attention; a medical gurney in exact match to the one Jack had been strapped to at the very start of the fourteen days he had now been unwillingly hosted to that by now may as well have been fourteen centuries. Except this one was ringed by a tight circle of near totally blinding surgical spotlights that glared into his irises and forced a succession of blinks so as for vision to swim back to focus when briefly glanced towards.  

Jack’s stomach flipped hollowly as they approached the centre piece but he stayed limp, allowing his body to be slid into the depths of the gurney. He stared straight ahead in meek submission as whitecoats pulled straps over his naked form, holding his silence even as the belts grew taut and bit angrily into the ballooned welts lining his swollen flesh.

A suction sticker was pressed to the side of his forehead, the intrusion repeated on the other side of space so as to form a perfect symmetry, the attached wires trailing his neck and raced across his shoulders to join a chunky box to his left.

From off his side Reaper remained silent and strangely still, and Jack realised with sickening epiphany that his observer was _gloating_.  

Maybe it was the culmination of over ten days spent treated like some animal or maybe it was the rape; the fact that the guy had shoved his dick in Jack to his pleas and screams and then the morning lifted him like some knight carrying their princess into the sunset to the happily ever after, but Jack had had enough.

He forgot his brokenness, he forgot the pain, the hurt and the need to douse his entire body in flames in the hope that if flesh bubbled and seared from bones he might finally feel some sort of clean. He snapped, lips scrunching over gums to expose dirtied canines in a rabid snarl. “What are you waiting for? Go on, I’m done playing dog and being your cock sock, so do it you sick bastard!”

What had started as an unsure whisper had risen to a howl, voice picking volume and rage as the tirade rolled further. “Just fucking do it already! Take my emotions and leave me a soulless puppet on your twisted strings!”

“Take your emotions?” The monster almost sounded horrified at the idea. “Oh no, Jackieboy.” He crooned, ignoring the hiss that fell from his captive’s lips as he stepped up and stroked Jack’s forehead gently. “I’m not doing that. Neither I nor Talon have need for another shattered marionette. We’re just going to break you. Break you and build you back up all nicely to what you were meant to be.”

A clawed talon tapped one electrode teasingly; the other hand cupped his cheek in firm grasp, forcing Jack's reluctant head to face the speaker. “All that anger, all that hatred at the world. The rage you had after Switzerland, that was _perfect_. Before they found you, softened you. Made you weak.”

Reaper had dipped his head so that the mask was now inches from Jack’s nose, emptied slits level with Jack’s own dulled pupils. “You’re a soldier, Jack. Always have been. But not for them. Not anymore. You’re my soldier now.”

The fingers to Jack’s cheek stroked the skin gently in some sick farce of love before the wraith allowed the flesh free and stepped away, his place taken by a severe whippet stick of a closely-cropped, redheaded woman carrying a clipboard strictly tucked beneath an armpit. “But don’t worry, Jack." Reaper purred darkly. "I look after my things. Mostly.”

Jack growled as Clipboard produced a bucket then proceeded to douse his head in the entire contents. The lines of the scientist’s thinned lips twisted to an arrogant sneer as the remnants of water tracked down Jack’s sodden face and exposed chest. Clipboard stepped closer, slipping a band of rubber from a pocket which was thrust towards Jack’s mouth.

Reaper chuckled from his new vantage as Jack’s teeth snapped a chase at the woman’s hand, taking smug satisfaction as she leaped back in terror, rubber stretch clutched to her chest. “Careful, he bites.”

Clipboard snarled angrily and resumed her composure, eyes promising bloody murder as she re-approached the gurney.  In answer to the second invitation of the strip, Jack’s mouth snapped determinedly shut, once more refusing the material shoved near his face.

“Fine fucking idiot,” Clipboard raged. “Bite your tongue off then.”

Jack reluctantly unhinged his set jaw, opening his mouth to allow the girl to slide the band roughly between his teeth.  

A second chuckle rumbled in Reaper’s throat, as if the monster was thoroughly amused by the scene. He gestured to Clipboard. “Begin.”  

Clipboard nodded then lifted her namesake, a pen plucked from breast pocket scratchily echoing a recording before the board was dropped back to the woman’s hip.

Her voice was matching in her vicious glare, severe tone extremely vindictive as she growled into a lump of coal plastic brick snatched with the pen and pulled to her puffy lips. _“Subject Morrison, Operation Day One. Subject extremely uncooperative and defensive. Reaction to Electro Conclusive Therapy, hence dubbed ECT Procedure so far undetermined, beginning dosage of  500 milliamperes.”_

There was a faint whirr as the machines around him hummed into sudden life, and then Jack’s skull exploded, the landscape above him blurring to chaotic undetailed mess.

_“Subject remains conscious and continues to refuse compliance. Dosage increased to 600 milliamperes.”_

His brain was on fire.

He couldn't _breathe_

He choked, despairingly searching for air

shattering in defeat upon finding none

He moved his hands so as to claw into his skull and rip the fire out but they remained pinned to his side.

He opened his mouth to scream but something clamped his jaw shut, a musky rag that his dentals drilled into as his muffled screams bounced in his stuffed ears.

_“Subject shows temporary paralysis and widespread muscle contraction. Dosage increased to 750 milliamperes.”_

He thrashed to the side but he couldn’t move.

The fire was burning, had swollen to a blazing inferno that had hijacked his entire senses.

He tried to howl but sound refused to come

Stuck dead in his throat

His eyes were stretched wide but for all

The detail he could make out he may as

Well have been blind

_“Subject barely conscious. Finishing dose at 900 milliamperes.”_

Over…was it over?

He blinked confusedly

Dimly hoping that this wasn't another trick

Respite glorious respite only for a plunged return to pain

pain pain pain

pain pain pain

pain pain burns oh god it burns burns BURNS

That no more agony would frazzle his nerves

That his body wouldn't scrape against the hardened 

edge of gurney in desperate yearns for escape.

He mewled as the solid was removed from his lips,

a line of slobber falling from the corner of his freed mouth.

He blearily glared at the swimming ceiling,

attempting to chase the white spots dancing in his fuzzed peripherals,

struggling against the muck that was pulling his senses into oblivion.

“Oh Jackie, you did so good.” Reaper – was it Reaper? – crooned in a faded voice that floated from the heights of somewhere above him.

Jack vaguely felt a hand caress the tops of his bangs in a way similar to Gabe. **Gabe.** God, Jack had never missed Gabe so damn much. But Gabe was gone. Gone from him after Switzerland. Gone, just like his team. Leaving Jack. Just Jack, all alone. At the mercy of the beast.

He closed his eyes, croaked a whimper, and leaned gratefully into the touch.


	11. Cornered and Collared

Therapy. That’s what they called it. He always laughs at that one. But the sound is always lacking in emotion. Falls flat as a dead corpse pushed down twenty flights of stairs. And whenever they call it that he always smiles. Bitter and broken, teeth like shards of shattered glass pushed up into his gums. And it’s ironic because he is breaking, those shards of shattered glass they’re _him_. His breaking mind. Or maybe he’s already broken and just hasn’t quite figured it out yet.

They smile too as they hold him down to poke wires onto his face and toy with dials to his blind side as he glares into the halo of lights crowning the sky. Everyone shares in the punchline.

Therapy. Saying it like it was a friendly chat on a reclined chaise with ink blots and check lists where Jack could ‘talk about his feelings’ to calmed understanding nods and have a lollipop pushed into his hands for his cooperation before he was guided out the door. _Therapy._ Like it wasn’t the morally wrong, inhumane torture they subjected him to.  

Clipboard has a name now. Dr Moira.

He thought he could never hate someone as much as he hated Reaper.

He was wrong.

She had told him on the third session, in between frying his brain like it was raw egg omelette goop on a heated stove. But Jack just calls her bitch. Doctor Bitch and her sick kinks. It’s a fitting name that he came up with halfway through one of their _talks_. Because he swears the sicko gets off each time to injecting him with 500CCs of pain. The way her eyes watch Jack like a slab of meat up for grabs whenever he’d been strapped down and thought the shade wasn’t looking, the lusty husk in her voice that suggested arousal as she listed the state Jack had been reduced to after being plied with nearly a thousand milliamps of agony, the gropes to ‘check muscle contractions’ that lingered far longer than they should – at least until Reaper twisted the doc’s arm so far behind her back it almost snapped in half.

The touches always ended rather rapidly after that. Jack had felt immeasurable thanks to the wraith for it. Then he’d kicked himself for feeling grateful to the guy who every night shoved his dick in his face. Between the two he’d decided quickly that Talon employed some sick fucks.

Jack never thought he’d say it but he missed the cell. The cell, with its dogbowl and its choking, creeping darkness and its inescapable loneliness and offer of escape through insanity. But at least the cell didn’t smile like Jack was some long lost lover as it electrocuted him to unconsciousness every two minutes. _Subject appears dazed and confused._

He fights them now, refuses to let them slide his body onto the gurney as easily as they had the first time. When he was broken and cracked and left in pieces. He’s still broken and cracked and left in just as many pieces but he tries. He does the best of what he can do because he’s always dazed and groggy, nowhere near full strength – the lack of proper nourishment and break to spirit had seen to that – but he’s still put some of them in the med bay. _Subject d_ _elusional, delirious ramblings begin when removed._

They’re not trained to fight. Their job is to push buttons, pull levers, not punches. He catches them easily, with a quick flailed fist, a sloppy blow to the face or chest, nowhere near as hard as he’d like, but he doesn’t need power behind the hit, the shackles they gifted do the damage for him and they still show up the next day sporting murderous glares, casts, plasters, bruised eyes, broken arms. Because in a battle of bone and metal, metal will always win, despite how dazed and malnourished the guy wielding it is.  _Final dose peaked of 1000milliamperes._

Doctor Bitch wasn’t the only one with a personal vendetta against him now. Apparently being the guy who breaks noses didn’t leave Jack as mister popularity. So now each session his new friends tie the straps extra tight, splash two buckets of water on his head, leave the rubber strap loose between his teeth so that he almost chokes or bites his tongue on the first couple of fizzles before they properly secure it, grin at him from their vantage (far away from his hands and angrily nursing bleached plaster) as if he deserves every spark currently shorting out his brain circuits. 

The clipboards and voice recorders have been upgraded to camcorders. It’s all filmed now. All of it. Jack’s entire torture all captured on home video, and they never let him forget it. Somewhere under that mask Jack knows Reaper has the biggest shit-eating grin whenever the cameras are rolling, acting like some proud parent filming their kid’s first steps into the world. _Give us a smile for the camera, Jackie_. _Say hello to your team, Jackie._ Jack’s humiliation snapped in rolls, documented like happy holiday vacation slides.

He pushed his legs into his chest, happy for the feeling of solid, the relief of existence. It’s always hard to tell what’s real or what’s not an electricity fuelled hallucination after the end of the sessions.  He curled into as small a ball as possible – not small enough.

He winced as his skin brushed the softened sides of Reaper’s newest addition to his quarters’ décor. He would have complained had he been conscious to when he’d first been shoved into the dog bed. But as it was he’d woken up in the damned thing and much as he hated to admit it, the soft fuzz felt simply glorious against his protesting aches, and he revelled in the warm embrace to the reddened welts and singes of hair that freshly lined his chest and legs. And if he closed his eyes he could almost picture the monstrosity as a cloud of cotton, so fluffy that he’d sank into the texture, glad for something other than the slab of harsh gurney edge or hardened unrelenting floor beneath carpet.

So instead of listening to the first instinct screaming to find the nearest box of matches and cremate the abomination he’d forced his body to still, huddled into a pile and basked in the feel of comforting softness moulding to his exhausted form. And hadn’t complained the second or third time when he’d been semi-aware of being dumped into it.

Comfort. A small luxury that he didn’t even know what he’d done to earn. He revelled in the feeling but it was always soured – he was pretty sure there would be at least one snapshot of his unconscious form huddled desperately into the warmth of the bed that would be shoved tauntingly beneath his nose at some point during his unwanted stay.  

Irritated, his fingers brushed his neck and found the resistance of hard leather. The collar. Another thing that was new. Another mark of ownership to go with the ones he carried in his mind and those carved into his skin. The bruises would fade. The bullet rips could be stitched. He wasn’t so sure about the scars beneath the flesh. He’d carry those – that evidence that he lived only at the whim of another – for the remainder of his life.  

Like with the dogbed, he’d woken to find the leather strapped securely to his neck, and with his still shackled hands, despite countless scrabbled attempts, he was utterly helpless to get it off.  And he’d tried his damnedest. Scratched until his nails were coated in globules of crimson and the outside of his throat was a fractured canvas, rubbed bloody red and raw.

The latest object of offence had an enormous metal ring to its front; the loop the start to a daisy chain of similarly leaded rings that secured to the wall at one final weighted hollowed circle. He’d quickly learned the chain yanked his head to remain dipped in a show of forced subservience, the lesson forever ingrained by the self-inflicted suffocation that followed a poor attempt to look too far up. The length of the newest restraint allowed little but enough movement to reach the bed - _Reaper's bed_ \- his basket was positioned by, but stubbornly anchored him to the spot before even halfway to the door, the line pulling taut and holding no give however many times Jack had yearned against it. 

The only good change was that he had apparently been pathetic enough to take pity on – a crisp pair of silken boxers now clung from his grateful hips. The relief that he was now at least partly clothed and wouldn’t be forced to withstand the side ogles of suicidal agents in corridors between the trips carried bridal style to Reaper’s quarters and lab outweighed the revulsion that someone had dressed him, and from the colour of the new attire (black) all bets pointed to his involuntary roommate, who given the collar, accommodation and daily watering’s, had decided he wanted a pet. Not that he went to some shelter and picked up some kitten or puppy like a normal, sane member of upstanding society.

He doubted Reaper would be able to even safely keep a rock as a pet; with his preceded reputation the pebble would likely end up being sacrificed for the greater good of being thrown through the window of the home of the latest antagonist of the monster’s temper, or just straight up dashing the brains of the offender. Maybe a cactus – they’d have a lot in common after all, both being ginormous pricks, but Jack figured the guy wasn’t the type to keep potted plants.

So the thought that the same being who had murdered hundreds of innocents, families, _children_ , without hesitation, felt some sort of ownership – and an extremely possessive one if the blackened splotches in the distorted print of fingers left behind on doctor dick’s arm were anything to go by – of him was a sobering and deeply despairing one.

He hugged himself tighter, trying to ignore the suffocation of the leather lashed to his throat, scrunching his watery eyes tight and imagining that he’s back at base. Safe. That he just got back from a mission with Lena and Jesse and after the usual congratulations of job well done he’d retired, exhausted, to throw himself to his bed.    

And for a glorious moment he could. He could tell himself that when his eyes opened they'd be greeted by duck shell blue. That a simple reach to his left would find the familiar solid of visor on the cabinet. The softness beneath the side of his cheek could easily pass for his mattress with a little bit of imagination and he could pretend the moans of his weighted limbs were the protests brought by a night of hard patrol and exercise.

All too soon he was dragged from the beautiful lie and forced back to reality. He whimpered, curling even further as the door opened, screwing his eyes tighter, hoping to stave the interaction off a little longer. Unfortunately, Reaper didn't share his patience.

“Come on Jackie," The monster cooed as he stepped forward. "Be a good boy. You’re going to come with me nicely, aren’t you?”

 _Like hell I am._ He wants to scream it. Wants to spit in the psycho’s face as he raves it at the top of his lungs, but his tongue’s ash in his cremated throat and his lips are puffed from the daily beg for water, so all that comes when the words are summoned is a long drawn croak.

Reaper seems to take it as confirmation because he unhooks the chain from the securing ring, holding it in his hands like the leash attached to his dog about to be taken for its afternoon walk. “Wouldn’t want to be late for therapy, would we?”

Jack smiled the broken glass smile that fell far short of his eyes and wheezed out the corpse laugh, the rasped chuckle rattling his throat like it's forcibly dragged from his insides. Certainly feels that way. _Therapy._ He growled and rose to a defensive crouch, angrily glaring at the speaker, as if daring them to try and take on more step closer.

He flexed his hand experimentally, wondering if today was the day he’d be able to catch Reaper square in the jaw with the metal restraints. God he hoped so. He’s sure beneath all that darkness and mist the guy is still somewhat human – even if he wasn’t, a faceful of hard metal should still smart like a bitch.

He snarled a warning as the man approached, leaning forward in his place slightly so as to gather better momentum needed for the spring of a leap as he prepared for the approaching fight. He didn’t care if he lost. Because he would. That was inevitable. He just wanted one good hit.

His hackles rose. Reaper strode closer. He bristled and flashed canines. _Come get some you fucking bastard._


	12. Lullaby for a Lover

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A brief ray of sunlight in this created Hell. What can I say, I'm feeling merciful, just don't go getting used to it.

Years of training, experience and if it was to be admitted paranoia, had left Gabe an incredibly light sleeper. He would bolt awake, immediately shunning any half-dazed, slumber-induced stupor to leap for the nearest choice of defence, upon the beginning of an intruding creak of a door or first softened footfall on padded carpet. Consequently he was an extremely hard person to catch by surprise, no matter the state of consciousness. Which was why it was with no difficulty that Gabe was instantly roused at the perfectly acceptable time of 3.42am to the first of distressed bellowed screeches that could only be done justice by a megaphone-toting banshee getting shoved through a food blender.

He snarled, eyes falling to the thrashing form strewn across the basket below his side. Jack was caught in a fit, heavy beads of perspiration lining his virtually bare form as he angrily tossed, seemingly possessed as he hurled himself into each of the lined sides of the bed.

So Jack was having some night terror. It didn’t matter. He didn’t care. Lots of people had those. They would be a perfectly normal occurrence for a person in such a situation and he could just leave him and-

“GABE!”

He halted mid argument, stilling to a frozen statue as if struck, all logic and reasoning draining at the garbled babble of dropped name. Dammit. Of course fucking Morrison would have a nightmare about  _him_.

Jack gave a broken whimper that sounded more like a puppy kicked to the face than any intelligent speech and the guilt that had been nipping at Gabe's heels – a buzzing gnat of annoyance that simply refused to be permanently swatted no matter how hard he'd tried – surged to his attention with a frightful vengeance.

His breath quickened and his head paused on its place in the pillow, his mind thrown into an inner turmoil as two personalities furiously wrestled for dominance.

Two sides to the one coin. Two minds to the one life. Reaper, the monster, the unfeeling murderer with his urge to tear and mark and  _possess_ , who knew little of anything other than destruction and domination. And Gabriel, the ghost of another time, a lost time, with emotions and regrets and  _memories_. Memories of nights spent curled into another, with his arm hooked across a stomach as he held them protectively into his form as the two lay happily entwined, lost to blissful reverie as they foolishly pretended as if they could take on the world and still make it through to the other side. Together.  

And yet here they were. Two remnants of a forgotten past, one broken and fractured beyond repair, the other dangerously teetering on their brink of reality. He’d failed. He hadn’t protected Jack when the world came knocking. He hadn’t protected him in Switzerland. He hadn’t even managed to protect Jack from himself.

His expression twisted, painted to  a pained grimace in mirror of the one stretched across Jack’s own and his eyes fluttered, torn in indecision between action.

Reaper would just growl, slap the bastard and force him to wake so as to regain the silence required for a proper rest. Or quietly observe and leave him to stew in whatever panic his subconscious had cooked up. Reaper wouldn’t take pity and wouldn’t even consider contributing any form of aid.

But Gabe would. Gabe recognised the man, knew the suffering inflicted. Too many times he had woken to something similar, to swirled auburn walls of fire and a final name howled in fitful desperation branded in impossible clarity in his waking mind as fingers clawed temples as if to drag the memory permanently out.

Jack screeched another death howl, bursting into furious manic ravings. “GABENOISAID NO ITOLDHIMNOBUT HE WOULDN’TLISTEN PLEASEGABE!”  The ramble slurred together, words descending to a sick gurgle nearing their conclusion as one violent roll too far yanked the collar to snap into an iron hold and separated all breath from body. Truthfully he didn’t know who the collar and its bracelet of chains were meant more for. To keep Jack restrained or to keep Reaper from riddling the captive’s shins with bullets to prevent another escape attempt.

Gabe blanched as pieces fell into their horrific places and realisation dawned. He slumped dejectedly into himself as if all life had been sucked from his shape. He forced himself to admit it, admit it, no sugar coatings. Jack was having a nightmare about that night. The night he’d totally given into Reaper’s wants because he thought he’d lost him when he ran to that bitch. The night he’d found him and held him down and forced his way, taken him through the screams on the sheets he was currently languidly stretched across now. And no amount of apologies or grovelling would ever make that right.

Gabe was swooping down and lifting Jack from the basket before he knew it. He was so light in his arms, like a broken little baby bird. The matchsticks of his bones were painfully prominent; the cage of his ribs jutting definitively from the sunken roll of flesh.

One of Jack’s flailing arms caught him on his front and he snarled, coiling a fist as if to retaliate. The blow had been a strong one; the shackle attached to the jerked wrist slamming into his chest, the impact wrenching the oxygen from his lungs, but he pushed Reaper’s boiling fury down and stubbornly resisted the urge to strike back. Not now. He couldn’t hurt him now. Didn’t want to break him further.

Because the therapy was working. Jack was cracking and he hated it. Hated watching it, loathed knowing it was his fault. He hated him, he loathed him, he wanted to wipe his entire existence from every corner of his mind. But fuck he still  _loved_ him. He couldn’t abandon him. Not when it was Jack. Unmistakably  _his_ Jack. The same Jack who had snickered as he’d snapped a pair of headphones over his ears, pinned an arm round his waist and tricked him into a waltz beneath the April night sky. The same Jack who had added two years to his age so as to be able to serve his country. The same Jack who had wordlessly passed a hand to cover both his eyes as he leaned close and brushed his lips to Gabe’s.

Coming back from being goddam dead hadn’t broken Jack Morrison. Crawling from a coffin back to a warzone hadn’t broken Jack Morrison. Twenty years of scenes, of close encounters with mutilated corpses of infants on the front line of crisis hadn’t broken Jack Morrison. But sixteen days with Gabriel Reyes had. Sixteen days of Gabe, 1000 mAs of regular dosed lightening and Moira.

Moira.

Moira was a slime stitched up in a skinsuit and with each interaction of the pig he further wished he really had broken her arm. Of all the people working for Talon, Moira damn well deserved it. Reaper and Gabe had been in rare agreement when they’d seen the scientist eyeing, groping,  _their person, their property._ Both brought together in perfect unison as they raged.

 **Unacceptable**.

But to the scientist’s fortunes she had her uses. For now. So Gabe had curbed the screeches of Reaper’s intent to snap the limb like a brittle wishbone and instead settled for something a little less maiming. He’d still been sure to get the point across though. Anymore unnecessary inspections and the octopus – useful though she may be – would be finding one sleazy tentacle stuffed with hot lead.

He sank back into the top of the covers, cradling Jack as a mother did a new-born child. He pulled Jack’s head into his shoulder and softly began to card his fingers through the silvered mop, each digit gracefully carrying the action, curling the ends to hangmen’s nooses with a practised ease.

“ _Dónde nos van equivocamos?_ ”  He breathed unsteadily into the still struggling man’s ear. He gently rocked the two of them, remorse brutally spearing his heart, tracks of moisture pulling at the corners of his eyes as emotions welled. Jack wasn't some dull corpse in his arms. Jack was bright and bubbled, a break of sunlight in the cloaked mantle of night. _This was wrong. Oh so wrong._ He congratulated himself but it was bitter and devoid of any triumph. He'd finally broken Jack and he felt terrible about it.

Jack’s howls had quieted to muffled whimpers, each a frantic mantra despairingly sung in a muted warbled voice of “Gabe Gabe Gabe.”

Jack quivered like a panicked rabbit in his grasp as Gabe swept sticky curls from the crimsoned face, his entire figure balking beneath the contact. Grief and regret pulled at Gabe’s heart as he stared at his companion, ensuing emotions dragging him down as if a weighted chain looped to his neck pulling him into the depths of endless ocean.  _“Oh Dios, qué he hecho?”_

Jack resisted, his eyes tightly bunched shut as he continued to brokenly wail. Reaper had quieted completely, the need to dominate entirely overthrown to the startled epiphany that this was Jack,  _Jack_ , sweet, kind, beautiful Jack in his arms who needed him and not some sadistic beast, needed his Gabriel. His Jack that he was ruining.

_“Duerme ya, dulce bien”_

His voice cracked slightly as he began to softly sing, the echoing rhythm as plaintive as the gazing eyes that forced themselves to the fragmented body pulled deeply into his chest. He felt Jack’s body fall lax, slumping to a soothed defeat at the re-emergence of a song thought long lost, slipping into the routine moulded by comfort through uneasy nights and sickness.  

 _“Mi capullo de nardo._  
_Despacito duermete_  
_como la abeja en la flor_.”

Jack moaned but paused in his arms, chapped lips flopping open and closed in low distressed whines for breath, the repeatedly bleated plea of  _Gabe_ playing from the puffed scarlet like a shattered record permanently stuck to the one line.

 _“Duerme ya, dulce bien_  
_Duerme ya, dulce amor_  
_Dulces sueños tendrás_  
_al oir mi canción_.”

By the finishing lines Gabe’s voice splintered, catching uneasily on each syllable. The sound had almost completely fractured, the tone steeped in stricken grief as he mourned the corpse drowning in his hold.

“ _Lo siento_.” He whispered brokenly at the melody’s end, closing his eyes and deeply burying his face into the crest of Jack’s locks as if hoping to bury the dense guilt that weighed his shoulders as if the entire world crushed to his back. He crumpled. “ _Oh Dios, lo siento mucho._ ”

He pulled reluctantly away, sighing ruefully at the disappearing press of lime scented comfort. More than ever he felt the weight of the mask on his face. A finger rose to the artificial cheek as if to test it was still rigidly secured in place even though he knew it remained stuck to the skin beneath like glue. He stared down at Jack who had calmed slightly and was now nuzzling into Gabe’s chest, pushing gratefully into this new source of warmth. He soothingly ran one hand down his back, etching light circles into the taut flesh as his own pitiful moans tangled with Jack's softly keened mewls.

" _Perdóname_ " He begged in a stuttered rasp, hugging the trembling figure closer as if hoping to shield the prone form from the horrors that both knew men were coming. A brief respite of protection before the day properly broke and the illusion of safety shattered once more. " _Perdóname_."

His mask remained resolutely in post as its insides dampened, flooded slick with crystalline drops that pelted down his skin as he bent his face to the side of Jack's and wept. Jack could, would,  **must** , never know the monster his lover had become.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Dónde nos van equivocamos - Where did we go wrong  
> Oh Dios, qué he hecho? - Oh God, what have I done?  
> Lo siento - I'm sorry  
> Perdóname - Forgive me


	13. Surprising Revelations

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Some cute ships before shit goes colossally sideways

Jesse was having one hell of a bad week, and when your day job consists of ducking your head to avoid the insides of that head from going  _splat_  and ending up on week long stints cuddled in plaster casts and bandages like some kid playing hospital in medbays on a regular basis, that means something is seriously fucked. And yet the array of gun muzzles near constantly pointed to his head and lengthy medical records were now as worrying as a poor stain on a report card. Soldier was still missing; Lena had only just recovered after having barely made it back to the base with her life and every time he laid eyes on a particular emotionless brute of a ravenhead he was overtaken by the inexplicable urge to sit the man down, force a shot of bourbon into his hands and get him to talk his problems out. Which would probably end poorly, given Jesse had no qualifications to help anyone get over a cold, let alone some decade long family feud.

And he wasn’t going there, no sirree. So he’d made a point to avoid the grizzled muscle mountain, distancing himself from possible pairings during missions and beating a hasty retreat in the opposite direction whenever he caught the back of an ebony top knot bobbing about in the base’s corridors. As it was, he was currently attempting to meld his form into a battered leather settee, safe in the knowledge that his unknowing tormentor would be locked in a strict regimen of training for the next hour. He was just beginning to properly relax when the intercom crackled to life in an announcement of arrival, startling all present into sudden animation in the communal kitchen.

He pushed his head over his shoulder in the direction of the counter where Lena was morosely seated and impaling a stack of pancakes with a rusted fork. The lack of enthusiasm had descended on all residents, the absence of the man regarded by many as a sort of father hanging like a weighted mantle on all’s minds, yet to see the brunette normally bouncing in place as if jacked on a litre of caffeine so despondent was extremely saddening.  

He shifted uncomfortably in his seat to a deep scowl, resenting the leather for being so plush. Comfort meant guilt when it was safe to assume the missing agent would be being at the same time, subjected to whatever gruesome methods of interrogation Talon employed. “We, er, weren’t expecting mail, were we?”

Lena shook her head mournfully before returning to spearing a hapless circle. “Wasn’t expecting anything today.” The unspoken  _unless it’s Soldier_ hung uncomfortably in the air. After all, why would the agent feel the need to use the doorbell?

“Guess I’ll go check it out then.” Jesse tried to hide the relief in his voice as he practically leapt from his seat and fled the room. The place was normally so loud – brought to life in between each mission with activity; Lena pinging off the walls, Genji  solemnly manning the cooker hobs, little Hana and Lucio holed in the corner to squabble over consoles and monitors – for it to be so dead felt painfully wrong and left the open walls, normally so welcoming, suffocating and claustrophobic.  

Either Jesse had smashed some mirror or the universe plain just had it out for him this week because he found to his despair that he had not been alone in his inquiries to the buzz of announcement – the noise had obviously rattled the eldest Shimada enough to pull him from his training activity and it was the worst sort of luck that Jesse, in his hurry to flee the depressed Lena, slammed straight into the broadened chest of the assassin.

His face flamed as he coughed awkwardly into a fist, offering a stuttered apology as his eyes ran from the one exposed raised nub to the trunk of tan neck, shaded burn of blush deepening as he skimmed hardened lips to hawk eyes. He briefly noted a thin line of perspiration clinging to the archer’s brow, the crystalline drops hanging from lightly crinkled lines like baubles from a Christmas tree. Storm Bow was slung easily over one shoulder.

“I er, sorry, didn’t see you there.” Jesse muttered, his tongue dead in his mouth as he hurried to move past. To his continued distress, the archer fell into line behind him, footfalls eerily silent, steps padded like a panther’s as he followed.  Jesse resisted the urge to run, an itch developing on the back of his neck as he felt the sharpened eyes needle into his skull.

The journey was mercifully quick and after having dealt with the usual securities you go through when opening doors to your vigilante, not-so-secret home base, Jesse was all too eager to open the frame, happily finding no sign of any serial killer come a knocking – though that didn’t stop the body from behind him leaping forward, drawing their bow and notching an arrow to the string, aiming as if to kill, in one fluid motion.

Jesse snorted and supplied a retort that he hoped was witty enough to cover his discomfort of “Fuckin’ Hell Han, it’s an envelope; it’s not gonna murder yer.” The speech was accompanied by a awkwardly heavy-handed slap to the man’s back as he hurriedly breezed past the poised archer (ignoring the headed musk that dripped from the toned lines of muscle) ducked a hand so as to avoid the pointed tip of arrowhead and snatched the parcel that had been left from the floor. Twenty minutes later and Jesse was wishing he’d let Hanzo shoot the damn thing.

_"Smile for the camera Jack."_

Not a lot could floor the guy, having already been pretty much to the edge of the sanity cliff and spat over the edge, but now Jesse was struck, his breaths hacked gasps plucked from his heaving chest. He was pretty sure his, along with the rest of the team’s, jaws had just slammed down to the table like a school of half paralysed fish. “No fuckin way.” He whispered, eyes drilled to the screen in front as if expecting the camera to switch perspective and a wig to fall off.

But the scene continued and those silvered tufts normally hidden by the visor stayed secured to the captive’s scalp. And nobody could fake contacts of those baby blues. Someone from his side that he was fairly sure was Lucio, shouted  _holy shit, is that Jack Morrison_? And after that all hell had collectively broken loose with each member jumping from their seats and exploding into sudden action.

Strangely brought to rare silence, he stared at Soldier76, or as Jesse supposed he should now be referred to as, Jack Morrison. His fingers twitched involuntarily against his thighs. Fuckin hell he was going to need at least a litre of booze before the world finally went back to feeling right.

Jack Morrison, back from the dead and strapped down on what looked to be an interrogation table in all of his birthday suit. And then the ‘therapy’ started. 950 milliamps of electricity. His knuckles paled to a bleached skeleton grey as they gripped the table edge.

He was pretty sure the next time he happened upon the wraith he’d be putting a bullet hole into that damned blank mask. So long as he got there before the queue – the meeting wrapped pretty quickly, with the youngest being hurriedly ushered out and the rest already dangerously close to forming an angry mob, swapping the blasé pitchforks and torches for furiously pumped rifles and blasters. 

Each person trooped dazedly out, still dumb in the shock that Soldier76 was actually the long thought dead strike commander Jack Morrison. The end of the gathering had also seen an enthused flurry of animation to the base’s training room as each member upon recovery raced to perfect their relationship with the armoury, each now furious and gunning for the head of one particular psychopath. He himself was just returning from a three hour stint of ruthless target practice, Peacekeeper still warm but now cleared of the last remnants of smoke and loyally fitted in its holster, swinging into his hip with each step.

He resisted the urge to loudly swear and bolt past as if set on fire to the safety of his private quarters, instead gritting his teeth and grunting a greeting to the Shimada leaned against his doorway, their arms crossed and expression glazed and locked to the distance, as if the man himself didn’t know exactly why he was there.

“I just wanted to…see if you were well in health.” Hanzo muttered stiffly.

Jesse frowned tiredly and rubbed his temples.

“Yeah it’s just, I knew him, Han.” Jesse exhaled, offering a rueful smile as fingers played with the edges of his horse blanket. “There were three of us, me, Morrison and our senior, Reyes. Reyes and Morrison, they were like my big brothers, looked out for me, snuck extra supplies, taught me the right end to hold a rifle without shooting my foot off. Then Morrison upped, got chosen for this project, super-secret and that, all hush hush. Made sense, he always was a damn good shot with a rifle.” Jesse tried for a crooked grin, but the effort froze on his face, failing to convince either of the pair.

He sighed. “After that it was just me and Reyes. Then he vanished too. Last time I saw either of em was at their tombstones."

He paused to scratch a sudden itch developed at the back of his skull, his voice tentative and soft when he continued. “He’s been alive all this time.” He shivered. “The stuff we  _did._ ” His voice splintered. “The stuff we saw. It fucked us all up, and the guy has his own grave, Switzerland, it can’t have been pretty.” His eyes tracked to the floor. “He was always happy, always smiling. Nothing could bring him down. That thing on the table, that wasn’t Jack.” Jesse broke off, the name descending to a mournful hiccup.

Jesse started as a hand cautiously pressed to his back, looking up to find the normally blank slate of expression strangely shadowed.

“How do you do it, Han?” He whispered brokenly, huffed a long breath and nervously ran a hand through his ratted locks. “Remain so calm, I mean. We just saw our teammate tortured and you can stand here without running into a total mental breakdown.”

The raven offered him a thinned shy smile. “Practice. Patience. Hours of meditation. It would do you good to learn.”

Jesse held his hands up in exaggerated defensiveness. “Whoa there sugar, I’ve tried that you’re standin on a beach crap and let me tell you,” he grimaced. “Not a fan.”

The corners of Hanzo’s mouth lightly curled as if left with a sour taste and he cocked one perfectly shaven brow. Jesse found himself wondering if the assassin ever clipped them to stay in their immaculate place. “Mahasati meditation is not the ‘you’re standing on a beach crap’.” He rumbled, clearly irritated at the comparison.

Jesse groaned, wrinkling his nose. “More mumbo jumbo? No offence Hanzy but I’ve never understood a word of it.”

“I could provide aid, if you should wish.”

“Well damn,” Jesse whistled, grinning. “Here’s me thinking you’re some bloodthirsty grizzly who’ll knock me on my ass and beneath all that you’re just a cuddly little teddy bear, huh?”

The man stiffened. “Do not make me regret my offer so soon.”

“Just tell me I don’t gotta sing or hum. I’m tone-deaf.” Jesse happily chirruped. 

Hanzo sighed in exasperation. “You are just a walking stereotype, are you not?”

“And you are far too stiff for yer own good. Remind me to get a drink in ya to loosen that tongue of yers. You make it sound like we’re in the damn middleages.”

“And you as if you are in some western flick. As does your costume.”

“Oh hun,” Jesse purred in a deepened burr, one eye batting a playful wink. “No one ever appreciates true genius when they see it.”

He swore as an alarm blared from above the pair’s heads – the kind that sounded as if a whale had just been pushed through a wood chipper. He pawed tiredly over an eye. “Is it just me or are death sirens never a good sign?”

“I can assure you, it is just you.” The assassin grumbled, but made no further complaint as he followed Jesse in sprinting back down the corridor to find out the cause of commotion.


	14. Identity Disorder

Jack was pretty sure he’d lost it. There was no other explanation for why he had heard his very much missed, very much dead lover singing _their_ lullaby in his ear, the words as vivid in his memory now as they had been when he’d last heard them all those years ago. Then again, it would be just like Gabe to die but only come back and haunt him now, when Jack was coming dangerously close to kicking the old bucket himself.

How the guy had ended up named after an angel was anyone’s guess because Gabriel Reyes had been no saint, rather he’d played the opposite end of the field as the devil incarnate. A cocky, charming devil who’d swaggered about as if he owned the ground he walked, hiding wit behind steeled hawk eyes and taming mirth to the hardened lines of his locked jaw, with a sinful tongue so silver it may as well have been the solid ore. The man had been soured only by his bluntness and temper; gaining a reputation for ruthlessly knocking fellow recruits down to size whenever they were in the wrong and possessing a fuse so short it may as well have been entirely non-existent, leaving a good two thirds of any personnel terrified of him. Gabe had been a demon, one that Jack had been perfectly fine with giving up his seat in heaven for.

Had being the very much fitting tense, because Gabriel Reyes was long dead, caught in the same explosion that so many had hidden his own corpse to. But Jack had survived, the sole survivor, and Jack alone had searched for his lover into the long hours, sifting through the rubble before the services came, his arms scrabbling through debris till they were bloodied stumps dead in their sockets, coming up with nothing but ashen cinders and the occasional lump of something that had used to be plaster wall. He’d frantically hunted until he’d been forced away, chased off by the emergencies team, slinking into oblivion, his heels dogged by the floundering spark of searchlights, passing into a lost memory as sirens behind his retreating back blared like wounded animals. 

Jack had long silenced the voice in his head, the echoing nag of _if you survived why couldn’t he have?_ Worn down by each dead end of his search, until eventually it had withered away altogether. He’d tried not to think of Gabe, knowing it didn’t do to dwell on the past, that it would just drive him into a depressed slump and then he’d be useless to helping those innocent getting hurt in the present. So it hadn’t been until that night – the night that he properly broken down and hallucinated being sung to by his dead boyfriend – that the nag had dared to come back, and even then it was swiftly silenced, put down to madness or Gabe’s ghost having some twisted humour.

It had also been since that night that Jack sometimes witnessed a complete U-turn in his captor’s personality.

Half the time he sounded so damn lonely, like a moping angst-ridden teen who didn’t just have their heart broken, but ripped from their chest and shattered in front of their eyes to millions of fragments. He’d look at Jack and sigh as if lost in some deep regret; sometimes even run a hand through Jack’s hair in a way he guessed meant as comforting. And the other half the time he’d be the biggest dick imaginable.

The mood swung so violently fast too – after the first few days he’d grown used to being hauled from his basket onto the bed, pulled close into the man as if the guy was drowning and only Jack could keep him afloat, only to be angrily thrown from the bed like a broken doll moments later. It left him with the feeling that Amelie hadn’t been the only one to have a mind fucked with by Talon’s team of crazed scientists. Sometimes he wondered exactly how they’d managed to make such a monster. What he must have been subjected to. How far they must have broken the man beneath the mask.

He never thought he could possibly feel pity for Reaper, but when you’re lying next to a man who’s burrowed his face into the back of your skull and forced to listen to their heaving broken breaths so wrecked in their efforts as not to cry, it’s awfully hard not to reach out a hand and reassuringly pet a back, much as he would do whenever someone fell into a slump back at the base.

Just the absurdity of sympathy or spooning with Reaper had him almost laughing aloud. And yet here they were, Jack’s eyes closed in concentration as he listened to his breathing, shaded hands that weren’t his own pressing him firmly into his captor’s body, the arms locked possessively to his waist, dragging him to their chest in an iron hold like he was the guy’s goddam teddy bear.

He knew he should probably be feeling some sort of resentment to his jailer, after all, he hadn’t exactly asked to be dragged from his place and shoved behind the closed doors of Talon home base for them to ram electrodes to his scalp and force lightening through his brain, and yet the touches were strangely reassuring; a painful reminder of happier times passed, but the contact was comforting all the same. Maybe it was because the break to the chilled demeanour showed the wraith to still be in some part human, despite having never once removed the mask dripped from their hooded face, or maybe he really had finally bought a ticket and boarded the crazy train. Either way, here he was, letting the beast use him as a body pillow.

There were other changes to, but those were more subtle – the way the inked shoulders sagged as if they were holding up the sky whenever he entered their room and locked eyes with his captive, the split second of hesitation that passed whenever he dropped Jack to the gurney, as if unsure whether to simply scoop the body further into him and bolt through the doors. He even had clothes now – even if it was only a bagged tee that hung awkwardly from his bony frame, rolls of weight lost to the new diet. It was far too big, reaching well past his hips, but he didn’t complain, rather enjoying the extra length that fell to his knees and obscured the edges of his boxers.

The chains and collar had stayed, and he still had to beg for water, but on occasion the bowl would be lifted to his lips, and sad as it was to say, he’d grown used to the routine. At the least it now earned him a brief ruffle of his hair or gentle caress of his cheek. And so far he hadn’t been taken against his will again. Small positives, but in the sea of stacked negatives, each luxury – no matter how small – was extremely comforting.

He breathed deeply, counting to ten in an attempt to even his ragged breaths, tremors continuing to wreck his form, his mind still thrown to chaos from the therapy session just returned from. Upon the closing lines of Doctor Bitch’s statement – _subject shows signs of exhaustion, nausea and muteness_ (no shit, one of the assholes that had it particularly in for him had deliberately ‘forgotten’ the rubber band and he’d almost bitten through his tongue, a coppery tang remaining in his mouth even now) – Reaper had petted his head almost sorrowfully, lifted him up and sped the two of them through the patchwork of floors and corridors, never slowing until they reached his personal quarters. He was pretty sure the guy who summoned the lift to the floor below theirs had come dangerously close to having a bullet through his ankle for his thirty second delay.

After that his escort had jabbed the door code in and spirited Jack onto his bed, curling their forms together into the position they were locked into now.

So here they were. Entwined in a tangle of limbs as Jack fought down the beginnings of a panic attack.

“I’m sorry,” Jack stiffened in the hold, the uneasy silence between the two of them shattered to the muffled whisper. He was unsure for a minute if he’d misheard. Reaper had always remained silent, simply falling asleep without a word, even in their past embraces. He'd never made any effort to forge conversation, let alone apologise for his actions. “If it helps any.” Reaper finished slowly. Jack’s eyes fluttered open, silently considering the row of cabinets to his front.

His jaw squared angrily as he clenched his teeth. “It doesn’t.” He ground, the words ringing dead but true. Because it really didn’t. It didn’t help. It made it _worse._ It left him wishing that he could just fob off the apology and offered comfort as fake, just another tack of manipulation, but he couldn’t. The emotion was too real, the words too honest, the voice whispering them too raw for it not to be genuine. The monster really was sorry. Jack didn’t know whether to laugh or scream at the revelation. It was some sick joke, he supposed, to show regret only now, when Jack was too broken to care.

He twisted his body so as to face his companion, curiosity overtaking the fear he should perhaps be feeling, his fingers tentatively rising to the face opposite, hesitant as they skimmed over the plated cheeks. They ran from the mask’s middle to its lower, before two hooked beneath its edge, pausing.

A moment passed between them, Reaper totally still, Jack holding his breath and silence, not sure if he’d finally be permitted to lift the mask and see his captor, but just as he was about to raise the edge a tremor ran the height of the form and the wraith growled, angrily jerking away, dismissing Jack’s fingers with a violent bat of his own talons.

His other hand fell immediately to replace where Jack had touched, frantic in his motions as he checked the thing remained attached. When his check had concluded it was indeed secure, the same hand rose, fingers forged to a straightened line lifted above his shoulder, the slap all but ready to come slamming down across the side of Jack’s face.

Jack quivered, freezing up like a startled deer eyeing its death in the approaching headlights, screwing his eyes tightly shut, features already twisting to the expected wince in anticipation of the impact. Yet all he heard was a growl, and then the weight of the bed shifted, the mattress springing joyfully up as the bulked form destangled itself from around Jack and fled from its warmth.

He opened an eye experimentally to a half lid, just in time to see Reaper’s back disappearing through the slid open door into the waiting hallway. Minutes passed and the shade didn’t return, leaving Jack staring after, stranded on the bed, his mouth twisted to an opened ‘o’ and brow furrowed as over and over the question played in his head. _Why didn’t he hit me?_


	15. Target Practice

Jack couldn’t decide what was worse; that he was holding a gun, an honest to god, fully loaded, fully working rifle that was a painful almost exact replica to his lost weapon, that he was shooting his _team_ or that Reaper was the instructor giving the private lesson. To be honest they all left him feeling like shit and his thoughts run down by a freight train.

It was Asshole Reaper he was currently dealing with. Teen Angst Edgelord had disappeared after the mask removal attempt. Jack had been left alone for hours in the room, and must have fallen asleep at some point because when he woke he’d been shoved off the covers and bundled to his basket, Reaper’s smug form already returned and starfished across the bed, the bastard somehow managing to fill the entire space. And when he re-joined Jack in the land of the living, boy had he been _pissed._

There had been no raged confrontation, only Jack meekly shivering his cowardice to a bestial snarl and a one-sided skirmish which had seen Jack carelessly dragged out of the room by the chains binding him. He’d been forced in tow behind the hulked form through corridors and into what must be Talon’s training room. Somehow the place had managed to retain the entire mental asylum aesthetic; a plethora of beige training mats joining the padded walls and bleached scrubbed white tiles starkly burned to pulsing hung spotlights – the kind that chased escaped convicts from prison break attempts.

The chain at his neck had been unhooked, the shackles on his hands, for the first time in _weeks_ , loosed – the metal falling to the ground with a satisfying clunk as he nursed his wrists to his chest, his fingers flexing gratefully in freedom, before a gun had been shoved into them.

It was a sour present that carried an even sourer message. Even equipped with a weapon, Jack would be helpless to take down the man he had _dreamed_ of shooting, spent hours of his life fantasising exactly where he would put each bullet.

And then target practice had begun and all he wanted to do was hurl the thing from his hands. But he hadn’t, because he couldn’t lie, it felt good, it felt better than good, to be holding it. Reaper had been right, Jack was a soldier – had always been and would always be a soldier – and hate it he did but some part of him recognised the weapon and felt alive just from holding it.

Not that that meant he would shoot.

He didn’t even know how they managed to create perfect replicas of his friends. But they – however they had done it – had. His first thought upon seeing the perfect Lena copy was holograms, but that was shortly disproven in the next five seconds, because holograms didn’t touch, holograms didn’t _feel,_ and holograms definitely didn’t slam you to the ground with a roundhouse kick when they got too close and you refused to shoot them.

The image in front of him was moulded far better than the fogged version that occupied his mind. The likeness was striking and had him questioning how he’d ever managed to forget the striking figure the spiked boyish brunette cut in her yellow orange latex jumpsuit.

His teeth scraped the insides of his cheek as he was floored for what felt like the hundredth time since the beginning of the lesson, one moment standing at full defensive with his feet placed apart, arms crossed into themselves to a deep set scowl, point blank refusing to fire, the next sprawled on his ass with the chill of refrigerated crash mat shoved between his shoulder blades, white spots swimming across his lids as he gagged for oxygen. 

“You’re doing it wrong.” His tutor pointed out emotionlessly as the Tracer copy backed off to the other side of the training mat. He spoke matter-of-factly. Like he was discussing the weather, and not murder.

“No.” Jack retorted hotly, dredging some part of still surviving spirit from god knows where. “I’m doing it _right._ ”

Right because he’d be damned if he let them teach him how to kill the only people in the world he had left to care about. The group of ragtag heroes and vigilantes were his family, Jesse, Genji, Lucio his adorable kid brothers, Lena, Hana, Mei his cute little sisters, stoic Hanzo with his difficult past the slight but still endeared black sheep, strict bulk of Winston the head and Angie with her doting and fussing the overprotective undisputed momma bear. He’d take a hundred therapy sessions unattended with Moroe any day of the week before he let them take that away from him as well as everything else they had already (Read: his loss of dignity, innocence and sanity).

He growled a protest as the shade loomed over him, hands invading his chest and hauling him back to a stand. He swallowed, mouth dry and stomach sick as the monster circled him, swimming the arc like a hungry shark sensed blood, once, twice, before pausing halfway of the third, coming to a stop behind him.

“At some point you will shoot her.” His tutor hissed in his ear. He quivered at the intimacy. “And when you do you will do it right.” Jack flinched, shuddering as a hand fell to his arm and raised the unwilling limb, bringing the gun up with it. He tried to wrench away, but a rough jerk found no movement in the steel grip.

“You will aim first for the centre of the chronal accelerator, that at least will allow further hits.” Jack yelped as the hands forced his arm to still, guiding the gun to level to the cerulean orb cheerily pulsing its existence in the middle of the copy’s chest.

“Then you will fire at the Achilles tendons to severe mobility.” The monster continued tonelessly. Once again Jack’s best efforts to free himself from the grasp were ignored and his arm and the gun were dragged to the commanded position.

“A clean shot passed through the shoulder will prevent retaliation.” He blanched, the weapon now straightened out as if ready to slam the bullet through the clone’s left shoulder socket.

Jack balked as the gun shifted so as to align with not-Lena’s skull. “Head shots are the optimal place of contact and the easiest option of termination due to lack of appropriate headgear.”  

He squeezed his eyes as Reaper moved closer, his front now firmly rubbing Jack’s back. The hand holding his arm dropped to his wrist then climbed his fingers, curling and pressing over the digits. He blinked rapidly, freezing up, trying not to think, to shut down completely as the wraith’s fingers tightened their cage over his and the trigger gave, recoil jumping his arm back, the not-Lena screeching in sickening betrayal.

_I’m sorry. Fuck I’m so sorry._

The gun fell from his shaking hands, passed to air then clattering from gravity’s throes with a dead thunk. Heavy beads of perspiration lined his features as he paled, lips pulsing blue as he choked on the bile drowning his mouth. He dry-heaved, ragged breaths rapid as they ripped from his falling rising chest in a near hyperventilating state. He moaned, collapsing back into the one behind him like a limp doll.

Moans became howls, his mind unrelenting in its guilt as it replayed the sound over and over, the scream, the sickened crunch of bullet battled through bone. He spluttered, coming undone to the sight of not-Lena’s body hitting the floor, the image forced on repeat through his scrunched shut lids.

At some point Teen Angst must have made a comeback because Reaper remained quiet, silently towering a much needed constant, just allowing him to curl his body into the thickened chest and wail, brokenly hiccupping into the folds of raven shoulder.

A clawed talon clumsily ran down his back and awkwardly petted the flesh, running sloppy circles whilst the other arm drew him in further, pushing his entire world to the mantle of night he slipped gratefully into.


	16. The Cowboy and The Assassin

Jesse was very quickly deciding that he needed a change in occupation. Perhaps something quiet and unassuming, like a librarian, or an accountant. But mostly something which didn’t carry a cordial invitation to an early funeral for every day he turned up. Jesse knew enough to knew he was in trouble, and if it wasn’t the seemingly endless stream of bullets popping off to the side of his head that threatened to take his skull and spill his insides to outsides (and he was quite happy with those where they were, thank you very much) in promise of permanent residence in a box of death, then it was the misdirected fire of the group of grunts storming the area in search of his team. Oh he knew there was a joke there somewhere, something Stormtroopers something inaccuracy, but frankly he was too pissed to care. It was bad enough with Lena still out of action, but when he got back he and Winston were going to have a not so friendly chat about their recruitment quota – if Talon got grunts to pad numbers then why the hell couldn’t they?

He growled angrily beneath his breath. He could think of decidedly better ways to spend a Friday evening - most of them spelling _bar_ and _booze,_ but none of the top hundred let alone ten, listed from the top of his ducked head involved crouching behind a dumpster in hiding from a world renowned sniper turned emotionless puppet.

It figured that the death alarm that summoned both he and Hanzo to the conference room as if followed by a pack of ravenous wolves would lead to a round of hide and seek that he really did not want to lose. He was beginning to get real tired of Talon and their ambushes.

Apparently Talon was just as enthused about him and his breathing habits because soon he was forced to abandon the comforting press of the dumpster in favour of hightailing it off into the row of streets, colourful swears and a steady chain of hot lead dogging his spurred heels. For the first time he was forced to reassess his fashion attire - sneaking away from your approaching death was awfully hard to do when every step had metal merrily cheering your existence loud enough for those over in the next state to hear.

He glanced mournfully at the offending boots. _Damn shame_. He grunted, sparing a moment to despair as he hooked Peacekeeper under an arm and balanced to one leg, flailing for balance, like a drunken flamingo. Another pang of regret and fingers were running the hide and heaving the left shoe off.

 _Goodbye old friend._ It disappeared into the pooled shadow cast by the towered apartments claustrophobic in their walls pushed above his head, the left sole closely followed by the right, and soon he was waggling his freezing piglets against the chilled concrete – moth bitten socks relieved of their post and tossed to a joint exile.

He felt a stab of distress at the loss, but reminded himself it was a necessary sacrifice if he had any desire to make it through the night with all necessary organs intact. And it wasn’t like he’d never run for his life on nothing but the soles of his bared feet. A few fragments of glass through an unprotected heel were a much better option than a bullet placed through the eyes.

He swore softly as his fingers skimmed to his communicator, fiddling with dials but finding only the eerie buzz of unrelenting static. So the line was down, again. He spotted movement from the corner of his eye and ducked off to the side, venturing further to join the darkened shadows offered by the line of buildings hemming him in.

He attached himself to the frame of a side door, burying his body into the wood just in time as a squad of agents rumbled past. He was good with his gun, that he knew, but he had no desire to take on the entirety of a Talon squadron – Stormtrooper aim or not – on his lonesome. Especially with the promise of Widow and Reaper hanging uneasily over his head like a guillotine blade waiting to fall. The two of them – and the hacker – were out there, somewhere. And as much as he would enjoy placing a bullet between Reaper’s eyes (and shooting one where the sun don’t shine) he had better sense to blindly rush in. Impulsive he may be, suicidal he was not.  

He counted the minutes, and when sure that the present danger had passed, allowed himself to fall out of the door, stress shedding to the slump of his shoulders as he stumbled to the edge of the wall, nervously ducking a head round the corner. His eyes gave a quick scan of the area, finding no immediate threat. Of course, that was if Widow even allowed herself to be seen. He darted an anxious glance to the obscured rooftops, aware the sniper could have set shop at any one of them. She could be standing above his head and the first sign of her presence would be the bullet hole burrowed through his skull.

He’d finally dredged the remains of confidence together to be ready to leave his spot, and was just beginning the first steps to venture back into the full view of warzone, when suddenly from out of nowhere a hand fell onto his back, dragging him back. He whirled around, silencing obscenities and drawing Peacekeeper level to find-

“FUCKIN’ HELL HAN!” Jesse screeched, chugging breath as he stooped over, chest thrumming raggedly as he bit back bile and his jackhammering heart rate receded to something that didn’t take after a startled rabbit. He craned his neck, lifting his head to glare at the appeared assassin. “Don’t do that.” He whined before standing, voice changing to show relief. “But I sure am pleased to see you, bud.” Jesse clapped the archer loudly on the shoulder. “When we get back, drinks really are on me.”

Hanzo slowly raised one clipped brow to prompt his disbelief, tightening the lock of his jaw and jutting his chin. Jesse swore he heard the muffled sound of a snort swallowed down, but when he looked his companion was not so innocently notching an arrow to his string, showing no signs of breaking his stiffly held silence.  

“What?” Jesse grinned toothily. He deftly adjusted his hat, sweeping straggles of rusty locks from his eyes. “Just gotta get through about a hundred goons, make it back to the pickup and check to see if anyone else is alive.” He shrugged. “How hard can it be?”

 _How hard can it be?_ Turns out a lot. Turns out as hard as an elementary student trying to understand a mathematical physics textbook. The sneak routine lasted five minutes – but in Jesse’s defence he totally hadn’t seen the Talon grunt coming round that corner, it wasn’t his fault he’d ran smack bang into the muzzle of a military grade pistol. Anyone could’ve. Except the trained ninja/assassin who’d somehow managed to get the drop on the goon – literally.

Not a lot could make Jesse scream, but he’d admit he howled like a startled schoolgirl when the bulk of Hanzo fell from the sky like some avenging angel dropped fresh from Heaven to crush onto the guy’s shoulders and slam his body none too gently into the ground. The air filled with the telling crunch as bone met hard stone. Face full of cobbles ouch. Jesse wasn’t the type of guy who revelled in other people’s pain, though there were a select few exceptions to the list. Crazy psychopathic madmen in skull masks and men who were about to scatter the insides of his skull on the street wall? Yeah, they were those exceptions.  

The sort of friend, sort of enemy (even he didn’t know what the hell their relationship was at this point) fixed him with a stern glare. “Be more observant of surroundings.” He snapped, before bounding off, admonishing lecture given, smoothly scaling the wall to his front with the grace and style of a practised acrobat. He hopped over the edge, vanishing to the lone existence to provide watch from above.

Jesse’s eyes tracked the movements, savouring the feline poise, the arch of the back and pulse of strengthened muscle that rippled lines through the man's garb. There was some jealousy, even with endless hours spent practising he'd never be quite as natural as the man who had such a fluidity each step he took turned an artful dance, each leap seemingly unfettered by gravity, as if he could jump straight into the sky and soar through the air unchained by physics, flying free like the twin dragons he possessed. 

Jesse's cheeks flushed, tanned cream painting crimson, his gaze lingering on the wall’s top even after the assassin had vanished – the strangled screams following the departure suggesting the roof hadn’t been quite as abandoned as first thought. He tried and failed to feel sorry for the screams’ owners. He’d sparred with Hanzo plenty of times and knew first-hand how deadly the guy could be, but at the same time it was hard to feel any sympathy for men who likely would have sent a hail of bullets as hello as soon as he’d popped his face to view.  

“Uh, thanks.” Jesse muttered to the thin air. He angrily scrubbed his face. Fucking Batman shit. He grinned to himself as he ducked out of the alley, keeping pace with the silhouetted shape leaping with ease across the maze of rooftops. He wondered if Han would get the reference. Knowing the stoic grizzly, he wouldn’t even have heard of the guy. Which wouldn’t do. He flipped Peacekeeper to attention, deciding that when they got back he and the assassin would be sitting down together and having an educative movie marathon, consensual or not.

Unknown to either of the pair, a watchful eye followed their movement from the perch taken up in the remains of a clock tower. The set up weapon shifted slightly so as to track one darting form below, though still making sure to hold the lithe outline skilfully bounding the street tops in close sight. Stretched lashes slid to clash together against the scope they were pressed into in a quick blink before widening apart once more.

A thinned smirk chased the edges of paled strict lips. A manicured hand, the skin tinged an unnatural purple, fell to click the arachnid head visor crowning her skull into place. “Movement spotted,” the woman purred in dulcet tone. “Two lost little strays.” The smirk widened. “They’re heading straight for you, Gabe.”   


	17. Ghosts of The Past

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Been a while, hasn't it? Well that's because life decided to throw two major spanners in the works, my laptop died and my USB that all chapters were backed up on got corrupted,so I lost everything.
> 
> Up until now I haven't been able to face rewrites, but now that band aid's been ripped off and here the chapter is.

Gabe was very quickly deciding that he needed a change in occupation. Maybe a desk job, something mundane, something small. Either way, one that didn’t have the ghosts of his past popping up out of the shadows to say hello, but kept them where they should be – dead and forgotten behind him. When she’d phoned in her discovery, Amelie had decided to play total team bitch and withheld the information of the ‘two strays’ heading his way.

He’d been hoping for the two girls – the sourly positive brunette and the touchy feely blonde, but no, of course not. The universe had to land him in front of Jesse McCree. Karma was acting like a vengeful ex who’d watched him kick a dead baby. And sure, maybe Reaper had. Maybe Reaper had kicked fifteen or so of the unbreathing brats. He hadn’t been counting (sixteen). The mission was the mission. And the mission must always be completed. Reaper was in control then. Reyes was just along for the ride.

Out of all three of the ex-recruits, the years had been the kindest to Jesse. Maybe it was something to do with the guy’s diet, or maybe it was the fact that he hadn’t been caught in a devastating explosion which decimated nearly all of his body or reduced him to incorporeal mist for random bursts of time. Either way the boy who he had snuck supplies to and doubled as when ill to run training exercises for had grown up.

There was still some of the youth he had known, for one the man’s feet were completely bare in a statement so painfully reminiscent of the kid who had chucked their boots to the side at every opportunity and tramped, squealing like a gutted pig, through lush emerald carpet. And the boy’s obsession with all things cowboy had developed to unhealthy infatuation if the ridiculous outfit was anything to go by. The military garb of uniform had always looked off hanging from the boy’s lanky frame, but the combination of horse blanket and leathered chaps was somehow worse, they held no place on a battlefield, more fitting to see some costume party than the action of front lines.

The eyes were hooded by the Stetson’s brim, and he wondered if he plucked the thing free whether the gaze would be that same one of innocent adoration he had once remembered so fondly.  If the tussle of hair beneath his fingers would still be so dirt crusted because the man still lacked any decent hygiene traits and refused to take a bath.   

The two hadn’t noticed him yet, some small victory, and so he found himself shadowing their steps, trailing after McCree whilst making sure to keep the raven panther fleeting the roofs above him in sight. The second runner was a total stranger. He had read the file, knew the name and weight of Hanzo Shimada. Could list the man’s history and preferences in perfect clarity. Yet this would be the first time they engaged. Reaper was eager, feeding the urge to simply leap and _act_ rather than hiding in the shadows like some cowering whelp licking its wounds. Gabe was not as enthused, two on one was manageable. Two on one with a height disadvantage pulled over was an annoyance but bearable. Two on one with a height disadvantage pulled over and a never before fought enemy was an annoyance that needed backup.

 ** _“Take the archer Widow.”_** He growled into the communicator. “ ** _Do whatever you need to keep him off my back, but the cowboy is mine.”_**

The smoothly whispered replying “ _Affirmative”_ was instant.

He shed the stress from his shoulders at the cry from above, watching as the man dove to his side, flipping his body with ethereal grace so as to avoid the peppered bullets raining his feet.  Jesse’s head snapped up at the commotion, the man pausing, gaze wrestling between his front and the roof, seemingly lost between continuing or offering assistance. Reaper took the opportunity to slip closer, firing off a warning round to the wall, just skimming the edge of battered Stetson. 

 _“Playing favourites, Gabe?”_ Sombra’s voice purred honey in his ear. “ _It is so unlike you to be eager to a history lesson.”_

Reaper snapped, snarling as Jesse scattered under another volley. **_“Silence little Sombra. Do your job properly and maybe this time you can make sure their link stays dead.”_**

 _“Shimada distracted, McCree fleeing down the dead end to your left.”_ Widow purred an interruption.

 ** _“See?”_** Gabe growled as he stalked after the receding back of McCree, entertaining a constant barrage of fire as he went. ** _“Some of us can actually do their jobs without fuckups.”_**

There was an indignant harrumph before the other end of Sombra’s line fell totally silent. Gabe figured she’d corner him when they got back, likely screech and threaten to spill his identity to Jack, but frankly he was too pissed to care. He had to deal with another ghost of the past and this time he’d damned make sure they stayed well and truly dead – even if he had to bury the coffin six foot deep and set up a 24/7 watch to shoot anything that tried to make it out.

“ ** _You’re losing your touch, cowboy.”_** Reaper growled, striding an advance.

The alley remained deathly silent of all but Reaper's ominously thudded steps.

 ** _“And you’ll lose more than your head when I catch you.”_** He promised darkly, fingers lovingly running the cooled inner ring of trigger.

He snarled, steadily losing patience when once more he received no response. He quickened his steps as over to his left a crate toppled, the crash followed by a string of soft curses in a deepened southern burr.

“ ** _Found you_**.” Reaper purred, closing in on his prey.

He rattled a laugh as a shot answered his next step, the runner stopped dead in their tracks by the wall towered to their back.

“Imma fuckin’ murder you for what you did to Jack.” Jesse growled, the spat promise's effect diminished by his figure, the man pitifully small against the loomed barricade he was pressed into.

“ ** _You will not be the first one to try._** ” Reaper drawled, bored, as a well-aimed bullet passed through his shoulder, the metal chip lifted through the mist of his form to burrow into a pile of boxes to his side. **_“You will not be the first one to fail.”_**

Jesse bellowed in anger, unleashing an unforgiving slew of hot metal that had Reaper been corporeal, would have seen his death multiple times. He smiled at one immaturely aimed shot, snorting a condescending **_“Really?”_**

“That was for Jack.” McCree answered brightly, his tone sickeningly chipper.  He was not so positive when a bullet buried into his unarmoured foot. Nor when another slipped a hole through the blanket wrapped to his shoulders and found his torso.

He answered with his own string of fire, but it was poorly aimed, the held gun shaking off kilter as a hand pressed into the fissures in attempts to staunch the draining of life force. They missed easily, barely skimming Reaper's shadow.

After that it took less than two minutes for the cowboy to fall, utterly defeated. Reaper swaggered forwards, his posture immaculate and his clothes entirely intact, a poor mirror to the ragged beaten whisper of a life collapsed, bleeding the stones crimson, before him.

 ** _“Any final words?”_** Reaper drawled, disinterested, as he held the barrel end of a shotgun to the man’s temple, the hat long flown off in discard to the ground beside the slumped heels.

Jesse raised his head, defiantly glaring. His lips opened, the beginnings of a _fuck you_ forming their shape, before his pupils blew wide to horror, mouth twisting as it threw open to an inhumane, dispairing screech.

“No Han, RUN!”

Reaper whirled, his eyes widening behind the mask as they fell to the darkened outline of the archer who had snuck from behind, arrow notched, bow stretched, pulled to his chest mid-flight.

The air was filled with a sudden roar, the tone thrummed with power that suggested centuries, millennia, of life, of watching civilisations risen and raized, witnessed to hundreds of millions of deaths and births. **“RYUU GA WAGA TEKI WO KURAU!”**

Three things happened at once.

The archer fell to the ground, slumped as if a bird with clipped wings.

Jesse scampered out of the way, diving to the fallen agent.

And twin dragons charged Reaper.

They were opaque in form, sleek bodies scaled to thousands of almost translucent blue pebble, twined in each other’s figures as they tore from the bow, charging forward, maws opened to a thunderous screech.  

They howled, passing through him, ripping him _apart._

Reaper screamed, his entire being thrown to searing agony.

And then they were gone.

His fingers scrabbled desperately, falling despairingly to clutch the remains of his mask in a poor attempt to hold the fragmented pieces peeling from his face together. His breaths were ragged, torn from his lips as someone plucked his ribs, one by one, out from their cage.

He glared hatefully at the man now cradled into the folds of a crimson horse blanket. He spared a glance to the one holding him, a pang of something, possibly regret, wheedling a speck of feeling at the track of pearl drops running the rugged face.

Then he fled, fading into shadowed mist and staggering down the streets, Widow’s voice worriedly blowing his ear. Frantic shrills of _Gabe? Gabe?_ And Sombra’s gleeful cackle dogging each wheeze that rattled through his teeth.

* * *

 

He stumbled back into their room, spewing curses and wishing the archer an excruciating end to existence. Jack’s face shot up from his basket, panicked, as he staggered past, collapsing heavily onto the bed. “Dos ’t tosh me.” He tried to growl as the boy crowded him, but the words rolled awkwardly off his tongue and came out slurred.

He tried to bat at the hand reaching for his bleeding face but he barely judged the distance and poorly missed, the limb slumping uneasily back into his chest. He was helpless as Jack pulled the shattered remains of ivory plaque from his face.

“ _Gabe?_ ”

He heard Jack’s sharp intake of breath, the incredulous but also scandalised tone that followed the shocked gasp. He felt hands trace his cheeks with a care and franticness as if they believed he’d disappear. He probably should answer. Sit up, explain. Or flee from the room. Jack knew. He hadn’t wanted him to know but he knew.

 _Okay,_ Gabe decided, _run on three._

On   e.

T    w    o.

T h   r    e       e

But he couldn’t move.

He was gone from the world.


	18. Broken Hearts Breaking

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Choo choo here comes that pain train. Next chapter; added angst of flashbacks! ...yay? 
> 
> That'll be up Saturday. Life's kicked up *internal screaming* which means only one update a week.

_“Hey!” The youth launched themselves up to a sky rocket, bounding from off the back of the truck freshly trundled the latest batch of recruits to camp. He landed cleanly on the ground, barely taking breath before hurrying feet pushed to a frantic sprint, lanky frame almost tumbling a step in its hurry to bolt over._

_The widened grin stretched from one ear to the other turned bashful as the boy skidded to a halt, huffing his way back to even gasps. The smile brightened once more as he shoved a hand out to in front of his chest, baby blue gems shining out from beneath a mess of caramel slicked bangs._

_“I’m Jack.” The boy excitedly chattered. “Jack Morrison.”_

_The man stared coolly back at him, eying the invited hand. His own remained stubbornly glued to his sides. Clipped bored tones, entirely as flat in their disinterest as the boy’s had been vocal in his enthusiasm, thinly muttered his own introduction. “Gabriel Reyes.”_

_The boy’s hand awkwardly hung between the two. Gabriel growled when it became obvious it would stay that way. Huffing, he took it once, exaggerated a shake and let go. Jack’s smile widened further. “Gabriel.” He echoed. “Guess you must be my guardian angel then.”_

_Jack took one look at Gabriel’s fallen face and burst into a fit of impish giggles._

 

 

“Gabe.” Jack numbly repeated the name. His mind protested, gut punching upheaval. He swayed, struck to a dumb stupor as he stared down at the now passed out man. The shattered remains of Reap-  _Gabriel’s_  mask quivered, dead weight in his shaking fingers.

Not Reaper. Gabriel. Because the man bleeding half his face into the pillow was without a doubt Gabriel Reyes. Albeit an extremely beat up version of the thought corpse. But those lids now pulled closed had only moments before been pushed open to amber rounds, the tone of skin, though now a slight sickened grey, still held the touch of burnt coffee tone, and the ebony locks that framed the ragged face were undoubtedly those that he had continuously yanked military cap off to a constant upset all those long years ago.

Gabriel Reyes was alive.

His throat tore out the first note of a chuckle, though the sound was dead and his mouth tasted suspiciously of asphalt. He guessed they were odd words, with less weight carried, coming from another dead man walking.

_If you survived the explosion why couldn’t he?_

All this time he’d hoped. Some small part, no matter how many dead ends the search reached, always holding out the belief that maybe Gabe had made it out. Maybe he wasn’t dead. Maybe Jack hadn’t irreversibly lost him forever.

They’d never found a body. Just like Jack, Gabe had an empty wooden case of death buried six feet to the earth’s guts. No one had expected there to bodies. Not from that level of explosion. By the time the undertakers were even notified they’d already had their funerals. Involuntary cremation by raged inferno. The inscription at Arlington was just a formality.  

And now here Gabe was. Right in front of him. Alive. Jack was close enough. He could reach out, could finally,  _finally_ touch his lover again. But all he wanted to do was run to the other side of the world and hide in his bed with the covers pushed over his head like a kid chased by the monsters from out of their closet.

He choked a sob, realising the moment he had dreamed of had finally come, and he was spending it wishing his re-animated lover had stayed dead. It would have been better that way. Easier too, because now he had to decide what to  _do._

He recognised the signs enough to know that he was sending Hanzo one very large bottle of sake in the mail. A quick body search and two bullet holes ripped through the cloak material, one to the shoulder and one slightly…lower, later had earned Jesse a lifetime’s supply of free drinks at the office bar.

He smiled to himself, though it soon faded, pulled to the gutting frown as he debated whether he should be searching for a bullet to pull out or drive further in. Two weeks ago and the choice would have been simple. Talon would be advertising for a best agent the next day and Jack would skip, one ass of a jailer down, happily off to his next  _therapy_ visit. But now… now Reaper was  _Gabe_ and Jack really did not fancy his chances alone with Moroe. Or Sombra. Or anyone in the enemy’s base without the protection of the Big Bad to his name, because since his stay’s beginning, Jack hadn’t exactly made friends with any of the opposing operatives. In fact, he was fairly sure there was a picture of him stapled to a dartboard in the grunts’ break room, given that he’d showed his gratitude for his host’s hospitality through black eyes and bloody noses.

He sighed, a weighty sound of self-loathing, and staggered unsteadily off, his mind still swimming in a chaotic fuzz, to Rea- Gabe’s bathroom to hunt out the nearest box of bandages.

 

* * *

 

 

Jack was curled up in an angry heap, huffing unevenly growled rumbles for breath when Gabe finally woke up. His eyes fluttered irritably before snapping open as the man across from him experimentally pushed a hand to the beige bindings now clumsily hugging his side.  

"All this time." He whispered dully, gaze never leaving the floor to his front . "All this time and it's been you."

“Jack.” Gabe paused, his face, now free of its covering, emotively twisting. “Jack, I can explain.”

“Can you?!” Jack’s voice jumped as he gathered his feet, pulling himself to a stand as worriedly gnawed lips tore open to an incredulous snarl. Teeth gnashed together, angrily scraping with each word gritted out. “Can you explain exactly why you had me fucking chained to your bedroom wall for two and a half months and not once bothered to say, oh by the way, I’m your long thought dead boyfriend?” He ranted scathingly.

“I didn’t want to hurt you.” Gabriel protested, crying helplessly. “I thought if you knew-“

“Didn’t want to hurt me?” Jack interrupted, throwing the words back to a bitter echo. “You  _raped_ me.” His voice splintered, sorrowfully cracking as fresh pearls gathered on the edges of dewy butterfly lashes. “You held me down and fucked me as I screamed at you to stop,  _Gabe_.” He spat the name to a fumed hiss. “That hurt me.” He paused to a stutter, furious eyes dulling as breaths turned pitifully ragged, his expression etched to a new agony. “That  _destroyed_ me.”

Gabe’s voice wrenched. He moaned, throwing his hands to his face. “I’m sorry. I’m so sorry-“

“Don’t.” Jack ragingly hissed. “Don’t you fucking dare apologise for what you've done.”

“ _Jack_ -“ Gabe begged, voice torn hoarse.

“Get out.” He whispered brokenly, backing further away from the man.

“Jackie, please-“Gabe pleaded, pushing himself off the bed to take a step’s approach to the trembling, near catatonic elder.

It was on that step that Jack lost it.

“GET OUT GET OUT GET OUT!” He howled, his arms slamming in violent jerks to his sides before rising to grip his head. His back found wall and he sagged gratefully against it, slumping into gravity to curl his knees to his chest. He sobbed, big fat tears that mixed with globs of mucus fled from his nose, the mixed swill swirling his cheeks to dribble down his chin. He bellowed and screamed and cursed, screeching obscenities and death wishes before coherence descended into sharply keened sobs that stole all air from his lungs, leaving him teetering off the brink of consciousness.

“Get out. Just get out.” He raked his nails across his flesh, pulling off strands to stain the sharpened stubs crimson. “Please.” He begged, tone thick to the broken despair fracturing each word. “Just  _go.”_

Gabe left. Jack didn’t look up or even care enough to open his eyes at the sound of the door – normally eased open to a gentle hiss – now slammed to a thundered roar. He didn’t move, rigidly clinging to his corner and ramming his palms over his ears, fingers impaling his scalp to cleave sickle gashes through his skull.

He wailed, not caring if anyone heard. Gabe was dead. Gabe was alive. Gabe had hurt him. The hands that had so lovingly and so gently and so carefully brushed his bangs from his eyes, caressed his cheek to praise, shed each button from his shirt to skim over exposed flesh and pull him close...

 

...were now those same hands that had so roughly and so violently and so unforgivingly stripped his unconscious form to shamed nudity, tethered his figure to heavy shackles, held his weight down as he was raped. The voice that had whispered soothing sweet nothings to tickle the inner ring of his ear was the same as that which had harshly chuckled before the act.

He wept, broken chunks of breath _shattering_. And all through the base the agents paused in their motions, training fire cut abruptly short and heads cocked curiously to one side, only to ashamedly toe the floor as they heard the stricken howls of the broken prisoner’s heart breaking.    


	19. The Times We Laughed, We Cried, We Cared

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Adorkable moments of Jack and Gabe's relationship. Just to make that pain freight train hit that little bit harder. 
> 
> I think I'm evil. 
> 
> Yes, I'm definitely evil.

_“Mmm morning Gabe!” Jack sang, bounding up from behind to encompass the man in an air-wrenching hug._

_“Hello Jack.” Gabe grunted, wheezing slightly for breath. His form stiffened, one arm rising to rigidly detangle himself from the limbs wrapping his neck._

_Pink blushed lips pulled over perfect dentals as Jack grinned. “Another beautiful day,”_

_“Another shitty day,” Gabe echoed hollowly, his voice flat._

_Jack pushed his head to perch on top of the messed ebony locks. “Aw come on Gabi, don’t be such a sourpuss.” He jabbed the soldier accusingly in between his shoulder blades. “You should smile more.”_

_“I don’t smile.” Gabe growled flatly, swatting at Jack’s face as if to drive him away._

_“Too right you don’t.” Jack chuckled, ducking his head to the left to dodge the hand charging for his nose. “That mouth is set to perma-frown.” He pouted unhappily, before the lips threw to a soft sly grin. “But I can fix that.”_

_He suddenly struck, lightning fast, and before Gabe could protest he'd hooked two fingers to the sides of the firmly set mouth. He pulled the downturned lines up into a reluctant grin._

_“See?” He smirked, pulling out a camera, enthusiastically snapping off a reel of shots. He gave a sharp peal of glee._

_“You look less murder your face-y now.” He chirped triumphantly, happily wafting the Polaroid images to clarity before pocketing his prizes._

_“MORRISON!” Gabe roared, veins popping coffee brilliant blue and cheeks puffed a furious red. He whirled round to grab for the man, but the soldier had wisely already danced out of the way, flipping a hand off in cheery goodbye as he ducked out the tent flaps._

* * *

 

 

_“Gaaaaaaabe.”_

_“No.”_

_“Aw but come on Gabi.” Jack pouted, blue oceans threatening to flood as he gave his best puppy eyes. He pulled on the end of Gabe’s sleeve. “It’ll be fun. Promise.”_

_Gabe stared at the boy uselessly attempting to drag him into the mass of idiots making complete fools of their selves as they writhed like dying fish to the pound of achingly loud obnoxious beats. “I don’t do fun, and I don’t dance.” He ground firmly._

_Jack gave a small huff of annoyance. “By the end of this year, I’m going to get you to dance with me.” He announced decidedly._

_The corner of Gabe’s lips pulled into a tight smirk. “I don’t believe you.”_

_“Well you should, cuz I’m gonna do it.” Jack, ever mature, shot his tongue out before puffing his chest proudly out, hands falling from Gabe’s arm to place on his hips, a fierce determination painting his face. He met Gabe’s eyes, all traces of humour disappearing, replaced to an uncharacteristic stern seriousness, solemnly declaring. “Jack Morrison is going to get Gabriel Reyes to dance.”_

_“Never happening.” Gabe muttered, deadpanned._

_“Is so.” Jack sang from off his shoulder as he disappeared into the throng, voice somehow managing to rise above the boom of synthetic music rupturing all present’s eardrums._

_He grinned wildly as he strode off, practically skipping in his eagerness to lend his form to the rhythm. The crowd parted, almost reverent, to allow him through, a light swagger to his hips. He flicked a gaze back to the figure leaned rigidly against the wall, glaring murder to anyone suicidal enough to dare approach within a metre._

_“Oh Gabi.” He sighed happily. “You’re never going to know what hit cha.”_

 

* * *

 

 

_“You’re not eighteen.” Gabe stated accusingly._

_“No,” Jack whispered, his voice deathly hollow. He felt strangely dwarfed by the man loomed over him, but the desire to crawl back to his bunk and run from the world to his covers was trumped by his body’s inability to do anything but stare brokenly at the body splayed, strung across to a gathering lake of crimson to his front._

_Jack flinched, withering beneath the violent growl rumbled through Gabe's throat. “How old?” The adult ground through clenched teeth._

_“Sixteen.” He laughed sourly, the broken sound scraped off his tongue. “Well, seventeen now, I suppose, as of last week.”_

_“Shit,” Gabe swore, exasperatedly wrenching fingers over his cheeks. “What the fuck are you doing here then?”_

_Jack briefly wrested his gaze from the fallen to stare mournfully at the tops of Gabe's boots. "I wanted to come.” He croaked, the gaze swinging back to the guy he had just shot._ The guy he had just shot.  _He hiccuped, realisation that he had killed, oh god, he had_ killed _, threatening to throw his reality under the bus._

 _“You **wanted to?**_ ” _Gabe's voice climbed to horrified exclamation_. ** _“_** Dios mio, _You are so much dumber than I first thought.”_

_“Yeah, I’m a real idiot.” Jack spat bitterly, his eyes furiously blinking back beginning twitches of irritation as he stared dully down to his still smoking rifle. The metal gently warmed but dead ice in his shivering fingers._

_Gabe paused, his tone softening. His hands scrubbed guiltily at his muzzle. “Sheesh kid, I, er, I’m sorry, I didn’t mean that.”_

_“It’s okay.” Jack wheezed. It was a lie. Because it wasn't okay. Nothing was okay. He'd **killed**. He was a **murderer**. How could anything ever be okay ever again? _

_He shuddered, pushed into sudden uncontrollable fit as Gabe moved closer.  He balked, throat leaping to keen sharp muffled whimpers as fingers prized the gun from his hands and arms gently cradled him into a broadened chest. He glanced up to meet sorrowful amber, innocent blue awash to horror._

_“Does it ever get easier?” he whispered raggedly._

_Gabe inched the hat from off Jack’s head, running fingers carefully to sift through the exposed bangs as he painted sloppy circles to Jack's back._

_“No.”_

 

* * *

_“Just give this one a chance,” Jack wheedled. He smiled. “It’s a classic.”_

_Gabe huffed, glaring at the device grasped in Jack’s hand as if it were some grievous torture instrument. He sighed, back slumping against the tree he was rested against in resignation. “I don’t have a choice, do I?”_

_“No~pe.” Jack sang, a hand grasping at Gabe’s elbow to pull him to his feet. ”Okay, hold still, or the wires will get tangled.”_

_Gabe stilled, reluctantly allowing Jack to plug an earbud into his drums. The boy cheerfully tapped the other wire sticking from his own ear, grinning. “We match.”_

_One finger flicked play, and to Gabe’s horrified dismay and Jack’s hooted joy, one heavily padded foot began to tap away absentmindedly to the rhythmic beat. Gabe coughed awkwardly into his hand, immediately stilling the limb, his mouth twisting to a petulant sulk, like a child just caught by their parents stealing cookies from the cupboard late at night._

_Jack’s mouth split wide, polished canines perfectly strung in straight rows flashed to an enthused beam. “I knew you’d like it.”_

_“It is…not terrible.” Gabe conceded sulkily._

_Jack snorted derision, dryly echoing “Not terrible” before he dropped, form folded neatly in half to a low bow. His bangs fell sloppily over his eyes as one hand folded behind his back, the other stretched out an invitation. “May I have the honour of this dance, good sir?”_

_“Go rot in hell.” Gabe flipped, making as if to turn away._

_“Not so fast.” Jack chirped, a devilish smile staining his lips as he straightened and caught Gabe’s arm. “Wouldn’t want those pictures of a smiling Gabriel Reyes to end up shared among the squadron now, would we?”_

_Gabe groaned, his mouth dropping open in disbelief. “I’ve changed my mind.” He growled. “You’re not some innocent soldier boy. You’re the devil.”_

_“Mhmm.” Jack nonchalantly hummed his agreement. “And you’re going to dance with him under the cold pale moonlight.”_

_“I hate you,” Gabe grumbled, scrubbing his cheeks to exasperation._

_Jack clutched at his heart, offering a sharp gasp of pain. His expression feigned betrayal before pulling back to a settle on a familiar widened grin. He shoved a hand on a hearty clap to Gabe's shoulder. "Nah, you love me really.”_

_“Hate you.” Gabe repeated, shaking his head despairingly. “So, so much.” He continued gruffly voicing discontent, but allowed Jack to pull him closer._

_Jack threw his head back and tinkled peals of silvered laughter. “Okay, first go with right foot, then your left.” Gabe stumbled over, prompting another fit of giggles from his partner._

_“That hand goes here.” Jack instructed, twining his fingers in Gabe’s left, gently easing the man’s hand to rest on his hip._ _“And this one goes here.” He ordered, lifting it into position. “And now you take a step, just like this.” He demonstrated the motion, pulling Gabe along to copy._

_Jack pouted his lips to a sharp appreciative whistle. “There, you’re a natural.”_

_Gabe ground a muffled grunt in reply, though his cheeks were tinged a couple shades darker and his grip was delicate, fingers held gingerly, as if afraid Jack would shatter._

_Jack moved closer, pushing Gabe's hands to fall on his hips. His arms snaked up to curl a gentle embrace around the man's neck. He exhaled, resting his head on Gabe’s chest, closed his eyes and listened to the life gently thumped out beneath his ear. He relaxed his control and allowed his partner dominance, falling to softly count out steps beneath his breath. “1, 2, 3, 1, 2, 3, 1, 2…”_

 

* * *

 

 

_“Okay, close your eyes.” Jack commanded, “And no peeking- Gabe I said no peeking!” he squealed, placing a hand over the soldier’s eyes. The other grabbed to his hip as he clucked his tongue, lightly scolding. “Honestly, you’re such a cheater.”_

_“No, I just don’t like waiting for my surprises.” The man smirked, obscured lashes tickling to scrape against Jack’s palm._

_“Cheater.” Jack repeated accusingly. He shoved his fingers into his pocket, rooting around the depths for a moment before fishing out a battered piece of paper. His brow knitted, eyes screwing in concentration as he struggled to make sense of the inky scrawls drawn across the ripped out page._

_“Turkey airo,” he stuttered, embarrassment flaring his face as he stumbled over each word’s pronunciation, clumsily staggering the rhythm that Gabe so effortlessly moulded so ethereally. “Turkey airo mucho, Gabi.”_

_His cheeks stained pink as he closed his eyes. Forcing his jumping breaths to even he leaned in, slowly bending closer and closer until his lips brushed against Gabe’s. He felt the man suddenly freeze in place upon the contact, as if unsure what to do, and worry pooled his gut. Suddenly he felt sick. He panicked. What if Gabe didn’t like him that way? What if he’d misread the signs? What if-_

_His thoughts trailed off, stopped short as his partner moaned into the kiss, a tongue hungrily lapping against his lips as if begging to be allowed in. Jack mewled as it crashed against the backs of his teeth, greedily surging around his mouth in exploration, pushing against the sides in a statement of ownership which he all too happily submitted to._

_He felt Gabe’s hands rise and curl around his waist, dragging him closer until their chests were almost touching. His own slid away from Gabe’s face to wrap the man’s neck, deeply moaning his want._

_He whined reluctance when Gabe pulled away, the raven's voice breathless as he moaned._

_“Jack.”_

_Jack panted, the rounds of his eyes near totally devoured to thick lust. “Gabe.”_

_“I think I’m in love.” Gabriel whispered, a hand uncurling from Jack’s waist to brush a stray caramel strand from off his lobster cheek._

_Jack's lips stretched to a contented grin. “It’s about damn time.” He grumbled. He’d opened his mouth to say more, but Gabe interrupted, laughing before hungrily leaning in to claim another kiss._

* * *

 

 

_“Do you think they’ll find out?” Jack whispered, his cheeks dusting scarlet as Gabe’s fingers twined into his own, their two hands resting happily on the top of his stomach._

_Gabe snorted, hot puffs of breath that tickled the insides of Jack's ear. “They’re the government Jackie, they know everything.”_

_His lips scrunched to a nervous frown. “Then do you think they’ll be mad?”_

_Gabe arched one clipped brow. “Mad that their two recruits are getting it on, or mad that Jack Morrison is taken?”_

_Jack giggled, playfully elbowing Gabe’s side. “Flirt.”_

_“Heartbreaker.” Gabe fired back, before returning the gesture._

_Jack snickered. “I’m not a heartbreaker.” He mumbled softly. “I’m just some farm boy from Indiana.”_

_“Yeah, just some Indiana farm boy with perfect skin and shampoo commercial hair.” Gabe shot accusingly. His free hand rose, as if to illustrate the man’s point, and began carding through Jack’s golden locks. “Have you seen the way they look at you in the showers?” Gabe growled irritably. “I can only shoot so many people by accident, you know.” He added, tone serious._

_Jack swooned, dramatically throwing a hand across his forehead. "Oh my fair knight, protecting my chastity.” He nickered, nuzzling his face further into Gabe’s neck._

_The man sighed. “Sometimes I don’t know how I ever managed to get you, Jackie." He admitted softly, burying his nose reverently to the strands of sunlight._

_As if in reassurance, Jack squeezed the fingers holding his own. “Well you did.” He chirped. “And now you’re stuck with me, sappy dance numbers and all.”_

_Gabe gave a bitter huff of laughter. "You act like we can take on the world.”_

_Jack made a happy noise of agreement. “We_ can  _take on the world. And we’ll win.” He turned his face to stare seriously into Gabe’s eyes. “Cuz it’s the power of love.”_

_“Don’t. Please, anything but that.” Gabe groaned loudly. “No. No please don’t start sing-“_

_He was interrupted by Jack, who with a wide grin, had already burst into joyful melody._

 

* * *

 

 

_“Jackie, are you sure?”_

_Jack shivered. He closed his eyes and nodded slowly._

_“Te amo." Gabe murmured delicately. Jack gave a delightful shudder, cheeks dusting gentle pink as fingers fell to his shirt, slowly pulling the first button from its place. ""I love you Jackie.”_

_Gabe's head rose, his lips slowly peppering kisses to Jack's neck as they travelled further up. Hot breath puffed his ear as Gabe leaned closer, dulcet tones purring pure sex.“"Te adoro." Jack keened sharply as canines teased light nibbles along his lobe. "I adore you.”_

_His face threw to flame as hands finished with the buttons, reverently shedding the fabric from his shoulders.“_ _Mi hermoso chico." Gabe whispered, drawing his head away to continue the trail of kisses back from the ear and down to Jack's stomach. Jack gasped aloud in heavenly pleasure as the silvered tongue ghosted, licking and suckling, deliciously swirling in sinful motion over a raised nub."My beautiful boy.”_

_“I love you.” Jack moaned raggedly, mewling a whimper as fingers hooked around the line of elastic to his boxers, gently easing the fabric down from his hips. “I love you Gabi, so, so much.”_

_"I love you too Jackie." Gabe promised, his own voice breathless. Heat pooled Jack's gut, and he groaned, thrown to ethereal passion as Gabe began to stroke gentle strips up and down his now exposed member.  He threw his head back, bucking his hips up into Gabe's hand, the other gently twined in his own, locked in a promise of forever between their pair._

_He winced, all of a sudden flung from smouldering lust to ice cold terror._

_“…Gabe?” Jack called questioningly, whimpering, but now in terror as the hold tightened, his wrist beginning to purple under the clawed talons now sunken into his flesh._

_He howled, crying in pain, shrieking as suddenly Gabe threw him down off their bunk, and he hit the ground hard, wincing to a pained ‘oof’ as he scrambled to back away but suddenly Gabe was on top of him, and those same hands that had been so carefully and gently unclasping each button of his shirt with reverent love were now viciously h o l d I n g h I m d o w n t o p r e v e n t e s c a p e. . ._

_“ G a b e ? ” H e r e p e a t e d , s u d d e n l y u n s u r e . He w h I m p e r e d , l o o k I n g u p t o f a c e h I s l o v e r , b u t t h e e y e s t h a t m e t h    I   s  o   w  n  w  e  r  e  b  l  e  a  c  h  e  d  a  n  e m o t I o n l e s s     s I  c    k      w      h    i   t  e             .    .    ._

 

 

Jack bolted back to consciousness, screaming. His fingers scrabbled over his skin, tearing strips as if hoping to pull the entire thing off. _Dirty, dirty, dirty_ his mind chanted.

He hiccuped, his breaths jumping, each wrenched from his clogged throat.

His cheeks were stained, the skin crusted over to a mixture of tears and mucus. Fresh moisture pulled at his lids, irritating his vision. His mind fuzzed, brokenly replaying the previous night’s reveal. Gabe was alive. Gabe was _alive_. His thoughts sang, thrown to joyful rejoice. Before realisation crashed down, dropped like an anvil on his head to crush all possible hope of happiness.

 

Oh

 

He froze, cowering as his mind threw open to chaos, tremors once again wrecking his curled up body. 

 

_Oh_

 

Gabe was **_Reaper_.**

 

Jack trembled, sniffling out a low whimper.

His heart beat, painfully loudly. A drumming screech that slammed through his ears and wouldn’t shut up no matter how hard he rammed his fingers down the tunnels. A constant reminder that he was a dead man breathing.

 

He stared brokenly. Stared and stared. Not moving. Not caring.

 

He wondered numbly what would happen when Rea- _Gabriel_ came back. Would he be angry? Would he lose his temper and do _that_ again? Or would he apologise and try to talk it out as he had already tried? And what would Jack do? Would he ever, could he ever forgive the man? 

Jack balked, shifting his gaze from staring brokenly off the distance into the wall to staring brokenly off the distance into the door.

He did not want it to ever open. Though even steeped so far he drowned in despair he still couldn’t ever quite trick himself into believing it never would.

When it did open, it was not for Gabriel.

“Come along, doggy.” Sombra sang, a sick sneer staining those purple painted lips as she gleefully wrangled the chain wrapped in plum talons. “Time for walkies.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Fuck you Sombra


	20. The Disappearance of Jack Morrison

“What am I going to do, Wid?” Gabe groaned, his head cradled between his hands to elbows propped off the desk. The splayed fingers cut sharply into the shape of his forehead, puncturing nails cleaving crescents through hardened crinkles of despairing frown. “I fucked up. I fucked up bad. He hates me now.”

“Well you did abduct him, take him without consent and lie to him about your identity for two and a half months.” The female seated across, hands gracefully skimming dulcet tones of melody from the monster, pointed out in breezed simple tone. “That would be plenty adequate enough to make anyone loathe a person.”

Gabe glanced from the floor to her face. Amelie, as always, held herself with the harsh sense of imposing royalty. Not many would dare to shorten her address or speak to the sniper so informally, but he and the woman had worked together so long they had fallen into an understanding of sorts. She kept her silence on his waging personality civil war, and he didn’t let on that Talon’s broken doll wasn’t quite as smashed up as the company thought. Amelie was in no way a friend, but she was the only person in the entire base that he would dare trust his back to. Which was why he’d hurried to her quarters straight from the confrontation with Jack that had gone about as poorly as he'd imagined it would. And then some.

“I thought I was protecting him!” Gabe roared defensively, his form shaking as he screamed angry protests. “It was doing the right thing!”

“No, you thought you were protecting yourself.” The female snapped bluntly. The calmed screen of elegantly sculpted lines framed by a thick raisin curtain twisted to a pained wince as her fingers plucked a dull note. The harsh sound crashed the eloquent rhythm dead. She took a deep, calming breath before resuming her play, the haunting melody eerily tinkling a soft background murmur.

“I am not going to tell you it will get better, Gabi. Perhaps it will, perhaps it will not. You screwed up. Accept it, move on. The only reason I am even allowing this waste of my time is because the only other alternative is Sombra, and even I am not so cruel to send you to that _chienne_.” Amelie’s voice dropped to a venomous hiss. “But this is your mess _, mon ami idiot_ , you must fix it yourself.”

“ _How?_ ” Gabe keened raggedly, his hands wrenching frustration down his cheeks. “He’s never going to forgive me.” He sighed, harsh tones softening out to a sorrowful mumble, words thickened to heavy regret “I would never forgive me.”

Amelie took no notice of the man’s grief, curtly snapping “That is for you to decide. You are a grown man, Gabriel. I do not stoop to baby children, least of all immature excuses of adults.”

“Yeah I care about you too, Wid.” Gabe grumbled sarcastically beneath his breath before falling deep into contemplative silence.

A thinned smile chased lightly brushed cyan lips. Yellowish gold rounds met tear-streaked amber as Amelie finally looked from the piano to fix her visitor with a piercing stare. “You are quiet. Has the great Gabriel Reyes finally decided what he shall do?”

“Grovel, beg, apologise.” His form withered as he cracked a bitter chuckle. “Probably get punched in the face. Hell I deserve it.”

“That you definitely do.” The sniper flatly chimed her agreement. She paused. “And what of Reaper? How is he handling such a situation?”

“He wants his toy. Wants to claim his property and fuck him raw.” Gabe muttered sadly, the words trailing to an uneven hiccup. He exhaled, his eyes dulling as he fell back into the depressive slump crippling his figure.

The delicate whisper of piano cut sharply off, its play ceased entirely. “Oh Gabriel. You really have outdone yourself this time, haven’t you?”

He glanced but stared past her, manic flashed eyes almost unrecognisable beneath the chaotic mess of night hung off uneven matted clumps.  Heavy trails of perspiration clung rigidly to bead his mournfully carved brow. He whimpered, a slight tremor running his body displacing the track of wet dew littering his cheeks, the voice as broken as its speaker as he dully whispered “I know.”

* * *

 

“Where’s Jack?” He growled, furiously eyeing the number one suspect in the man’s disappearing act. He had recovered enough control over basic emotion to finally stop the flow of tears weathering his face and after a long lecture snapped out by Amelie after the woman had finally cracked beneath his pitiful so called 'kicked puppy' act, eloquently summed to shut up and sack up, had forced a reluctant return to his chambers. Only to find the room empty. All signs of Jack’s ever having been present entirely cleared.

Sombra snickered over the top of plum painted talons as she relaxed her posture, smugly reclining on her covers like some ancient ruler. Her eyes feigned indifference as she gazed at the figure who had just stormed her bedroom door. “Oh I’d say about halfway across the country by now.” She tossed the words carelessly, fingers flipped to casual dismissal as the choice of a gleeful smirk overthrew the usual obnoxious sneer.

“No games, bitch.” Gabriel’s figure shuddered as he stalked forward, steps impaling the carpet to ominous thuds. “Now answer the question, you jumped up upstart of an excuse for existence. Where the fuck is my Soldier?”

“Transferred this morning.” Sombra preened, proudly boasting. “Moira doesn’t want any distractions. Says he’s perfect as he is.”

Gabe roared, vision smeared heady crimson as he flew forward, fingers wrenching for the woman’s throat as he yanked her free from the bed and slammed her head back against the ground to an oh so beautiful hearty crunch.

“Temper tantrums?” She scolded, clucking her tongue. She stared up, a quirked arch casually holding his glare as she leaned her back easily into the plum embrace, acting as if sharing pleasant conversation and not inches from taking final breath. “How immature. You’re acting like a child, Gabi.”

“Shut up.” He snarled, eyes narrowed to dangerous slits. The small part that wasn’t howling rage for the loss of his man revelled, rolling in the satisfaction of the feel of her body thrown up against the floor, life entirely defenceless in his hold. “You don’t get to call me that.”

“Ah but if I don’t, who else will?" She purred mockingly from beneath him, grinning widely. "Jack is gone. You’re never going to see him again.”

Gabriel’s temper angrily flared up, his breath pushed to fumed sharp hisses as both warring identities found rare agreement and bayed for blood. “I should kill you.” He snarled, pressing his face closer to hers. “I should squeeze and squeeze until that face of yours turns that purple you love so much and you’re gagging for breath as your lungs give out to the fading thump of that pathetic organ of life and then _keep going.”_

As if to illustrate his point, his grip tightened, the woman giving a ragged choked gasp as healthily tanned flesh tinged a sick mottled blue, gripped beneath the closing trap as sharpened talons pressed together, drawing pricks of crimson that oozed down her contorting neck.

“Oh but you can’t.” Sombra hacked out, the dying gurgles somehow still candied to her usual smugness. “Because then our employers would know that someone on their payroll was having second thoughts.” The sneer stretched wider. “And you know how dangerous those can be.”

Gabe gave a frustrated growl, dropping his grip and snatching his hand away to his chest as if she were diseased. He rose from off of her, fingers balled to tight fists as he whirled, stomping away.

“This is your fault, Gabi. I warned you before that you would kill him.” The woman cackled as she picked herself from off the floor, grimacing tightly as claws pressed the raw patch lacing her throat. “You did all this. Not me.”

Despite his entire being crying waves of protest to rip shotguns from his form and shoot the bitch straight through the skull, Gabriel kept walking. He didn’t turn or offer some witty comeback. Because sadly the worst excuse of human scum was right.

* * *

 

Amelie sighed, her hands falling to her hips as she watched the enraged hulk of Gabriel Reyes thunder past. “I know that look, whose murder must I cover this time?”

“Jack’s gone, Wid.” He growled, spitting darkened fury. “They fucking took him.”

“Gabriel.” The femme fatale muttered warningly, unhappily murmuring her discontent. “What are you going to do?”

Gabriel stopped.

He knew enough of the past to know he couldn’t change it. But you could bet he was going to do everything he possibly could to change this future. Because there was no way in hell he was leaving his lover with Talon.

The company had created a monster to run their missions. Well they were about to learn exactly what happened when they messed with that monster’s mate.

Mate because yes, fuck it, he wanted Jack to be that. He had to admit it. There was a Soldier sized hole missing in his heart that only Jack Morrison could fill. He desperately wanted to return to the times when he could whisper a simple word in Spanish to coax the beauty back into his arms, his body yearned to hold that perfectly sculpted ethereal form to his own and to bury his nose and kiss that gorgeous mess of caramel bangs.

Determination painted the sorrowed expression as he resumed his pace, stalking fiercely past, broken steps renewed with new purpose. He had a mission now. Save Jack. Apologise for being such a fucked up bastard. Then he was going to do all of this properly. No more lies about identities or hiding feelings. Flowers, chocolates, consent.

“Bring him home.” His jaw clenched tightly in place, lips twisting to form the solemn promise. 

 _"Just hold on Jackieboy."_ He murmured softly. _"Your Gabi’s coming for you."_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Brain: So what are you going to do?  
> MUI: Grovel, beg, apologise. Probably get punched in the face. Hell I deserve it.


	21. A Progression of Plot

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A healthy dose of healthy relationship. And angst. Jeez this chapter took forever and many, many rewrites. I don't write happy well.
> 
> Jesse is an adorable creampuff, Hanzo is an innocent little cupcake, Lena ships McHanzo hard and Angie is a snarling grizzly.

“I know that look.” Jesse sighed unhappily as he eyed the slumped shoulders of the raven perched precariously among the battered cards and fauna of offered well wishes at the end of the bunk. Had his arm not been held prisoner to unforgiving plaster he would have wrenched his exasperation uneasily through the ratted ends sticking his face. 

“For fuck’s sake, Hanzy, quit moping.” He offered a starring wry grin when the man’s head finally raised slowly from off his chest, sombre twin charcoals unusually expressive as they stared mournfully.

“Doc’s already given the all okay. I ain’t gonna drop dread, just getta have one helluva lie in.” He rasped out a throaty chuckle, though any reassurance the act possibly made promptly took one step forward, a good twenty back as the sound quickly descended into choked hacks of coughs that convulsed his wrapped figure. Wounds flared at the movements, each jerk beckoning pulled grimaces of agony.

The elegant features of the one opposite twisted to a pained wince, the form withering as it retreated uneasily to the chair’s back rungs. “Had I been but a little faster you would not be in such a state.” Normally cooled eyes were thrown to the chaos of emotion, dew sticking to the inky sky of jet lashes boxing them. The voice fell to soft, apologetic whimper. “For that I am truly sorry.”

“You’re shitting me.” Jesse groused. He gingerly propped his weight against the stack of pillows to his back, levering himself to lock eyes, tone echoing disbelievingly. “Han, you saved my life.” Words turned quietly serious before he grinned, the pale of humour returning. “Flying in like some damn avenging angel, had you not made it at all, Reaper woulda snuffed my sorry ass offa the heel of his shoe.”

Hanzo slid further into himself, the corner of his mouth twitching delicately down as his features played morose. “It was still my mistake to make.”

“We all make mistakes, boyo.” Jesse simpered, his lips swept back over gums, pearled teeth flashed in a sloppy grin, “S’what makes us human.”

“But-“

“No buts.” Jesse interrupted, cutting firmly over. He pouted his lips and waggled his eyebrows. “Now, you gonna tell me why I got such a fine one visiting me in these here kind of godforsaken hours?”

Arms crossed uneasily, defensively, over Hanzo's chest to the protested moan of silk textile. “I came to talk.”

“Well sugar, you’re doing a stand up job of it.” He cooed, offering yet another blinder of cheeky grins.

Eyes darkened further, gaze retreating into the distance as weight shifted, squirming uncomfortably in its seat. “I came to talk about my brother.”

Jesse was pretty sure someone would have to collect his jaw off of the bindings snaring his chest. His mouth flopped open, oxygen chugged to the mercy of disbelief. He gaped, his tongue rolling uselessly to lap at its sides. He stammered incoherencies, grasp of language struck into dumb stupor. He hadn’t known what to expect of ‘talk’, but certainly not  _that_.

He felt a small puff of pride. Hanzo hadn’t gone to Winston or Lena or Angie. He had gone to  _Jesse_. “Well darling, I’m told I’m a pretty good listener, not much else to do other than that anyway.” He muttered, recovering the use of basic English.

“I regret attempting to take his life.” Hanzo gave a bitter chuckle. “And yet if I had not answered the blade then some other would have. And there would be no guarantee the kill would be swift.” His expression shadowed, eyes suddenly fleeing to Jesse’s gaze, almost pleading in their search for acceptance. He blinked, a sour tang of bile filling his taste. He had never seen the normally infallible man so vulnerable. “I did what I had to ensure that pain was minimum and as fast as possible.”

Understanding dawned, realisation softening Jesse’s features. “You killed him so that he wouldn’t end up tortured in some freak’s backroom.” He whispered, reaching a hand to paw comfortingly at his friend’s arm. “Aw gee, I’m sorry Han, that’s really fucked up.”

The archer bowed his head, his body trembling lightly. “He is ready to forgive my actions. I am unsure if I will ever be able to forgive myself.”

Jesse patted the wrist in front. “It’s okay hun, you’ll get there.” He soothed, before voicing the question that had struck him the moment the man had so suddenly brokered the subject.“But why are you saying all this? No offence but I mean, normally getting more than five words out of yer in a day means the sky is caving in or something.”

Hanzo raised a clipped brow in humorous question. “Oxton suggested I attempt better communication.”

Jesse's lips pursed together. “And she did so because?”

Fingers uncharacteristically toyed absently at the hem of frayed ends, suddenly more nervous child than trained assassin. “I thought you disliked me.”

Jesse’s eyes widened, his voice jumped to a startled outcry. “An’ why the hell would ya think that?”

“You run the opposite direction whenever you see me.” Hanzo stated plainly, turning his face away to stare at the tile. If Jesse didn’t know the man better he would say he was sulking.

“Oh.” Jesse gasped. “ _Oh.”_ He repeated, breathing heavily as his heart picked pace. Guilt dropped a boulder in his belly. He hadn’t meant to hurt Hanzo, but then again, how else would anyone take another turning tail and bolting like some startled lamb just spotted wolf whenever they saw each other? He cursed his stupidity. For all his perfect flawlessness and cooled distance, the man was still  _human._ Of course he’d be hurt.

“Aw shit, that wasn’t cuz I don’t like you, I uh, I do.” He confessed. The flames of his cheeks fanned to an inferno as he blushed. “I like you. Hanny. I like you a lot.”

He groaned to himself. This was not how he had imagined this conversation going. Hot tropical beach or lowlit skyline, yes. Hospital ward, stuck in some hospital bed, trussed up in enough wrappings to win a starring role of some tacky horror flick, the artificial glare of medical lamps that bleached the tan in front of him stark grey a poor stand in for the romance of warmed sun set or rise? No.

“Then why do you run?” Hanzo’s voice betrayed his puzzlement. “You like Oxton and my brother, yet you do not flee from them.”

Jesse almost shouted aloud in frustration. He'd said  _I like you_ , hadn’t he? What more did the agent need to possibly understand? It should have been clear, but no, the guy was still staring at him, eyes only daring to read his lips and head cocked to the side like some confused puppy.

“Yer a bastard yer know that?" He muttered disbelievingly. "A right bastard. Really gonna make me come right out and say it, aren’t ya? Goddam it Han.”

He ignored the sharp bolts of pain, lifting his body and pulling the man’s shoulders to wrench his figure down before he had chance to change his mind. In for a penny, in for a pound and all that. Hanzo didn’t taste like how he’d thought, he was softer than the wall so often imagined, sweeter than the shadow his nights had come to be filled with, though the tops of lips still carried a bitter tang of sake remnants. He pulled back, leaving the contact to a quick peck before snapping away.  

“Oh.” The statue paled, suddenly looking as if he wanted nothing more than to to bolt from the room.

Jesse tried to shoot down his disappointment at the man’s response. Or lack of one. What had he been expecting, for the ice prince to suddenly thaw out and profess he too felt the undying flames of love? Fat chance. Still, it hurt, stinging right in the middle of  _something_ , and so he forced himself to plough on before rejection could properly register and begin to pull water to his eyes. 

“I’ve been thinking. Not a lot to do other than that, lay ere and twiddle my thumbs." He paused, blinking the beginning of moisture away. Darn allergies. "And I don’t care what you say Han," His voice hardened as he fixed the silent protester with a stern glare. "I’m breaking into that Talon home base soon as I’m able to set one foot outa this bed.” 

“I figure there is nothing I may offer to sway you.” Hanzo murmured, tones unnaturally resigned to their fate.

“Damn right there isn’t.” Jesse declared, voice strengthened to the fierce determination now lining his face. “I’m not leaving Jack alone with that monster any longer than he already has been. Guy’s already been through Hell once. I won’t sit on my sorry ass and give him a free pass for a second trip.”

Hanzo inclined his head gently in acknowledgement, puffing a small exasperated sigh as if he had expected nothing else. “Then I shall accompany you.”

“Aw sugar, you do care.” Jesse purred sweetly, batting his lashes.

Hanzo’s brow crept into a slight frown at the action. “Yes, it would be unpleasant to have to break your own pitiful behind from Talon’s operations.”

“Baby, you’re making me blush.” And he was, to his horror, his face flogged, beaten to an allergic lobster. Because surely that meant the stern man cared, or at the least didn’t wish his painful death.  Which was fair improvement from the first Hanzo he’d met, when after the slightest casual jibe to stoke ego the man had drawn his bow, notched a shaft viper quick, and attempted to stick an arrow through Jesse’s left eye. Naturally, Jesse had made the wise decision of continuing his badgering, earning the threatening of his other bodily parts and two matching shiners of panda eye before the assassin had stormed off to find some rooftop to brood off of.

Dead parents, complete emotional detachment, total stick in the mudd-iness and a thing for showing nipple. The assassin really was extremely similar to Batman. Which prompted him back into his self-proclaimed crusade of forcing the guy to a much needed movie marathon.  First the classic of Nicholson, then the tack of Clooney, then the wonder of Nolan. Oh he had so much beautiful, brilliant knowledge to impart-

“Out,” The appearance of the golden-haired, scolding hand on hips medic interrupted his inner ramblings. The mamma bear’s face was stern as she angrily shooed the archer away from her cub’s bedside. “The patient needs rest and recuperation, and  _no alcohol_.” She emphasised darkly, fixing the man with the type of glare that had most grown men quaking in their places.

Jesse snickered to himself as Angie tugged a silvered hip flask free from out of some hidden silken fold of Hanzo’s costume. He raised a thumb up awkwardly, mouthing a silent  _thank you_ to the archer who returned with a curt nod before they turned, back chased by an insistent Angie, disappearing from sight. His eyes rose to the ceiling, lips pulling up into a cheered grin as he leaned back into the comfort of pudgy mattress. And they said romance was dead.


	22. In Need of a Hero

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Whoo boy, major plot, and hey, if you ever wanna stop by and say hello, I just climbed out of the hole I've called home for the last six years and finally joined the society of tumblr, so that will have all about future projects and rough ideas of schedules. http://mindlessthoughtsofawildmui.tumblr.com/

Everything had been going well. They’d had a plan. Half a plan. Two thirds of a plan. Three sentences. Get in. save Jack and/or kill Reaper. Get out.

And really it had been going so perfectly it was only a matter of when until something serious hit the fan. They’d slipped in easily enough, even the goon patrols had been laughingly simple to avoid. The place was so huge Hanzo had agreed – reluctantly – to a split up. Jesse had tried and failed to pretend he wasn’t staring at the godsend of an ass as the assassin darted off into shadow.

Even flying solo, he’d avoided detection so simply the words _it’s a trap_ were already rolling off his tongue. Unlike most super high tech state of the art villain lairs, there didn’t appear to be any cameras lining the halls, and with the approach of suspiciously open door, poke head through then immediately shut, disappointed, he was making steady progress through the maze work of floor. However everything fell apart when Jesse stumbled into one room, and found himself staring at-

“Fucking hell,” His voice broke incredulously as his eyes boggled. “ _Reyes_?”

Sure, his brain supplied helpfully, just go with it. If Jack could survive that explosion why couldn’t the other supposed ghost in his life?

Even with the years of companionship under his belt, he almost didn’t recognise the man. Gabriel looked awful. His face alone looked to have been embroiled in a wrestling match with a weedwacker and lost. Crusts of tears and blobbed mucus painted the area around cracked lips, whilst eyes were bleary and faded, brokenly staring off into a time ten years passed. When the mouth opened tell-tale retch of booze rolled out, swaddling the slumped form like some especially strong perfume. Ode de la alcoholic.

The head didn’t raise from off the desk. “He’s not here, McCree.”

Jesse clocked the darkened robes. The emptied bottles strewn at the wraith’s feet. The room decorated to an angsty teen’s daydream, but with an unmistakable Gabriel Reyes touch. He’d never been the brightest spark at maths, but even he could add one to one to make a genocidal maniac.

“You’re Reaper.” His voice cracked as unwanted understanding dawned. Words climbed as horror gave way to blind anger. “You fucking bastard how could you? Jack loved you, he loved you and you, you fucking-“ He broke off from his tirade, pausing to angrily chug breath. When he spoke again it was to an odd calm. “I should shoot you.”

“You should.” The corpse laughed, the sound unnervingly devoid of life. “You really should. I deserve it.”

And he could. Peacekeeper was within reach, there were no Talon grunts nearby to stop him, the ones that did would take roughly five minutes to reach his location and Gabriel was in no state to offer two minutes of resistance, the agent wouldn’t even be off the desk before a bullet hole was burned into his sternum. Jesse had been handed the dream each of Overwatch had shared ever since first watching that horrible video way back when on a gleaming silver platter. He could end this for good. One shot and this could all be over.

Except it wouldn’t be. Because Jack still needed to be rescued.

So instead of pulling Peacekeeper from its holster and shooting Reyes in the head – and oh he really wanted to pull Peacekeeper and shoot Reyes in the head – he strode over, yanking the man up from his chair by a fistful of jet cloth.

He pushed his face into the man’s personal space and glared dark, brutal murder. “Where’s Jack?”

He gagged on the latest wave of liquor stench. “Here. There. Anywhere. Where are any of us?” Gabriel chuckled bitterly. “Dead. Alive. I don’t know. He’s gone.”

Jesse’s grip tightened, his knuckles dusting bleach white as their hold trembled. “You took him, you must know.”

The face fell further into depressive slump as the form retreated, shrinking in on itself. “Not anymore. They wanted him broken.” Reyes whispered, his voice pitifully small. “Well I fucking broke him didn’t I?”

Icy tone darkened as Jesse shook the trembling mess. “The hell you talking about?”

Eyes spun in their places fitfully, fingers wrenching at flesh in jumpy, jerked motion. “They wanted a Soldier. Obedient. Angry at the world. Not some idiot with identity complex who’d murder their agents on the drop of a stubbed toe. They wanted Jack. Always have. And I gave him to them. Handed him over wrapped up all pretty.”

“ _Shit_ , Han,” Jesse swore into his comm, worry sparking when all that responded was static. “Jack’s gone.”

 “Gone gone. Jackie’s gone.” The imitation of man in front rambled unhappily. New tears glistened his eyes. “Soldier, Soldier, my kingdom for a Soldier.”

Jesse eyed the half-filled bottle stood on the abandoned desk. “You’re drunk.”

“Supposh I am.” Gabriel slurred, descending into a series of broken hiccups.

Jesse’s shoulders slumped, rage temporarily forgotten, replaced by alien pity as he stared at his former idol. “Christ Reyes, what the fuck happened to you?”

“Love’s a disappearing act, death’s an illusion.” Expression sobered for a brief second, before the mouth fell, mournfully curving into a surprised gasp as the head whirled, gaze zoning to the bed as if expecting a third inhabitant to pop up from the covers. “Here Jackie Jackie.”

“Jack’s not here, remember?” Jesse snapped, his irritation returning.

“I know, dios mio, _I know_. They took him and I couldn’t stop them and now he’s gone and I don’t know where.” Gabriel sobbed, any part of sense descending into absolute mess. “He was the best thing I ever had. And I, I fucked up.”

“Yeah. You did.” Jesse growled bluntly before his tone softened. “You should’ve come to Overwatch. God he would have been so _happy_.” He paused, the knife in his gut twisted, his throat choked up to emotion. “But Talon? Why the hell are you working for those mooks?”

Gabriel gave a casual shrug. “They offered the biggest paycheck.”

Jesse’s hand sang before he’d even realised the slap. “You sold him out, the love of your life and you sold him out, for money?!” He spat, any earlier sympathy for the ruined creature drying up.

Gabriel’s response was drowned in the sudden eruption of klaxon as maroon and cobalt flooded the room in angry flashes. He shuddered, the earlier _it’s a trap_ running back across his tongue. He hoped Hanzo, wherever he was, was alright.

He raised another fist, only for it to be stopped in its arc by a steady hand.

“We must depart.”

Jesse ignored the archer, crimson staining his vision as he yanked the fist from its trap, raining blow after blow onto Gabriel’s face. Hanzo could go, he didn’t want to see the man captured. But he didn’t care about escape, wouldn’t think about it, not until after he’d finished beating the monster into submission.

“Jesse,” Hanzo was urgent. Something akin to worry giving the name a rare, frantic edge. “We need to leave, _now_.”

“No!” grunted, repeating the word, only louder, as he screamed, the hand on his shoulder now firmly pulling him off the ghost. Spittle flew as he surged helplessly against the grip, bellowing and straining at the bit like an enraged bull seen scarlet.  Froth burst the dam of his lips, dribbling his chin as he was dragged, screeching, words spewed venomous breaking above the wail of alarms.

“I’m going to kill you, Reyes, I’m gonna fucking murder you!”

His eyes bulged as he fought the grip, squirming as he was pulled through the door and down the corridor. “Let me go Han. Let me go right now.” He pleaded, but the archer sternly blanked him, stubbornly continuing their way. “ _Please_ Han,” he begged. “He deserves it. Look at what he’s done and tell me he doesn’t.”

“Another time.” The agent murmured, the grip slackening for a moment as another hand comfortingly patted shoulder. “He will taste death, I promise, but I will not stand by and watch you captured for something so insignificant as revenge.”

Jesse paused in his thrashings. “Heh. You really do care, dontcha?”

The archer grunted, seeming to reach a decision and choosing, instead of dragging an unwilling full grown man through the maze, to carry him bridal style. Jesse squawked, kicking indignantly as strong hands picked him up and buried his body against tan chest.

The response was so softly quiet Jesse wasn’t sure if he’d imagined it.

“More than you will ever know.”

 

* * *

 

“I told you, left.” Gabe snarled, not looking up as the door opened. He growled, angrily nursing the bottle into his chest. Couldn’t even the dumbest of idiots see he wanted to be **alone?** “For the thousandth fucking time, they went left.”

An exasperated sigh followed and he balked, suddenly drawn into a chilled body. “Oh Gabi, you let them get away, didn’t you?”

His eyes scrunched tightly as his shoulders fell in defeat. “How couldn’t I, Wid? Fat lot it did anyway. Jesse wants to kill me.”

“Mon ami, in our time together I shall admit, I have grown fond of your presence," Velvet tone confessed. "I dislike seeing you this way. So I shall say this, it will get better.”

“Will it, will it really?” He gave a bitter laugh, wincing as the bottle left his lips, the liquor shrieking protest as it burnt down his throat.

Slender fingers pried the vial from his unwilling fingers. “You will not find answers at the bottom of a bottle.”

“Four months, Wid.” He slumped against the woman, keening mournfully. “Not one word. Not one lead. And every mission I have to see Sombra’s smirking resting bitch face and listen as she rubs my failings in my-”

“You will find him, Gabi.” The sniper interrupted smoothly. “He is out there, waiting for his prince.”

Gabriel sighed brokenly, lifting his eyes from off the discarded label. “Well then his prince should bloody hurry up, shouldn’t he?”

“Yes.” Widow smiled as she reassuringly petted matted, unwashed lumps of raven. “He really bloody should.”

* * *

 

“One more time my Soldier- no, my _Cadet_.”

He disliked the name. It hampered his skin, itching over his flesh. It fell to flat notes, felt oh so wrong. Yet he would not say this, choosing to calmly hold his silence and suffer the irritating buzzes in quiet.

“What are Overwatch?”

“A disgusting enemy bringing ruin to the world that must be stopped.”

He recited the line easily, as if read off a script, in a blank voice as he clipped, speaking the answer ingrained to perfect clarity in an otherwise fuzzed mind.

“And Talon?”

That too he knew. Knew, told, believed.

“Our glorious organisation bringing hope to hopeless reality.”

“The mission?”

There was no hesitation before the response.

“To be completed at all costs.”

“And Gabriel Reyes?”

Cold hollow tone turned vicious as dead eyes sparked alive to fury. He leaned forward – the first movement he had taken since they had first ordered him into the plastic chair, a sneer decorating his lips as he locked his gaze with the doctor opposite.

“The man I will _destroy_.”


	23. Disco Inferno

“Speak fast, don’t give me crap and you might even live.” Gabe hissed. After raiding three Talon bases to find nothing, both his and Reaper's patience were painfully thin, less of a minefield and more a nuclear bomb ready to blow. “Where. Is. Jack. Morrison?”

The hapless wrong time, wrong Talon hidden base hallway man trembled beneath him, his shaking hands pushed in front of his face in defence. “I don’t know, I swear.”

“Wrong answer.” Gabe pushed the barrel end further into skull, Reaper taking sick pleasure as he flinched, dissolving into further mess. “Perhaps you’ll be more talkative if I give you some incentive, hmm?”

The grunt screeched as the other gun lurched back against his ankle, jumped to recoil as spurts of ooze decorated mottled tile crimson. Gabe leaned forward, dangerously close as he pushed his face inches from the sobbing other’s. “Now tell me, where is my Jack?”

Eyes rolled back in their sockets, worriedly gnawed lips wrenching open in sharp gasps. “Moira,” The grunt garbled. “Moira took him for experimentation. One of the old bases. That’s all I know, okay? Really!”

“See the problem is," Reaper leaned closer, puffing chilled breath over the shuddering lips. "We don’t believe you.”

“There are files.” The agent babbled . “Cameras. We had to help with the equipment. She liked to film everything. Said the footage was for private use. It’s hidden but accessible with the right access level.”

Gabriel's fingers closed tighter over the trigger. “What are the films of?” 

“I don’t know!" The worker cried, voice raised to a wail as eyes lurched upwards, helplessly trying to see their mortality. "I only carried the boxes they said to!”

The grunt gave a pathetic squeak as Reaper lost patience, his hand slamming hard over the broken ankle. “Where were you told to take them?”

“L-lower level." Panicked tones stammered. "They didn’t like us going down there. Said it spooked the animal.”

A scream erupted as Reaper twisted the gun further. “What animal?”

 “I dunno, there were rumours. Guys would go down. Some didn't come back. The ones that did had ripped uniforms, bite marks, claw scratches. Project Cadet. That’s all they told us when we asked.”

“We thank you for your cooperation.” Reaper murmured sweetly.

The grunt’s eyes turned hopeful. “So you’re not going to shoot me?”

“Oh we are." The ghost promised happily. "But you’ve been ever so helpful so don’t worry. I’ll make it quick.”

_“Does it ever get easier?”_

_Mournful, kicked puppy eyes stared into his own as the boy trembled, a frightened rabbit seeking comfort in the embrace of the sly fox._

_“No.”_

Gabriel had lied. It did. On the fiftieth time he had pulled the trigger and realised they were just another nameless face in the sea of forgotten souls. He felt nothing as he slid from off the corpse.

“Hold on Jackie.” He growled determinedly as his heels speared the bloody tiles, pace spurred into a desperate sprint. “Your prince is coming.”

 

Ten minutes later and he was growling for an entirely different reason. He stared, hot spurts of rage catching his throat closed and spilling from off his lips, wanting to look away and yet hypnotised by the scene playing in scratchy filter off historic old timey projector in front of him.

It had only taken a matter of time to locate the lift, level and room. Getting in was easy – Reaper had clearance everywhere and even if the shade’s prints should have been wiped off the system, he had the feeling Moira was the sort of demones who wanted the monster to see what had become of the man he loved. The sick, sadistic bitch.

The films had been even easier to find; each ordered in neat little rows, lovingly titled in long, elegant scrawls of ink.    

 _“Begin training exercise one_.”

Gabe’s breath caught in his chest. It was _Jack_.

But it wasn’t.

The man in the cage – solid iron bars, ceiling low enough to just graze grayed head, hardened grey unforgiving floor, it could hardly be called anything but – was both the love of his life and a complete stranger.

Wary eyes, devoid of innocent glow, flicked in quick, frantic sweeps of surroundings as matchsticks of limbs pressed closer together in an animalistic crouch, the head stooping as arms curled for ravelled nails to claw over bony, hairless chest, so raggedly worn down each bone could be easily picked from the thin layer of flesh pitifully clinging it.   

Silver hung poorly off the sallow face in sick, matted clumps; handfuls dyed vivid crimson, the gashes pecked into skull still visible through the almost translucent strands. The hook of nose hung at a poor angle, so awkward Gabe knew it couldn’t be anything but broken. Pink blush lips had been worn into murky brown, chunks torn violent craters from the soft surfaces.

Noise at the side of the cage startled he and the creature, both bodies jumping as one section of bars suddenly unlocked, the wall sliding up as the man backed away, pressing further into the opposite bars as a crumple of cloth was thrown in to the cage’s centre.

Then the cloth moved and holy shit, Gabe realised the thing was alive.

Barely. Dark circles bagged bleary eyes half obscured to lank strings of greasy chocolate. The newcomer screamed, scrambling up from off the ground, flinging himself against the bars furthest from Jack, whose head had snapped up at the action, eyes sliding from the sides of the cage to settle on the newest decoration, almost hungrily.

Limbs unlocked from their tangle, slowly, deliberately, as he padded towards the man.

Gabe suddenly felt the strong urge to leap into the film, gather Jack into his arms and run, preferably to the next state over. But he couldn’t, no matter how hard he wished he could. And so he stared, uneasy chill climbing his limbs, freezing each in place. Could only watch, horrified, as Jack fell on the cowering agent, unarmed, crawled on all fours, pressed uneasily into the wall. Fear shredded his mind, biting through sense like a rabid dog refusing to let go, as the grunt’s words flooded back, echoing through each thought mockingly. _They say it spooks the animal._

“No Jack.” He whispered beneath his breath. Don’t do it. Don’t let them turn you into a monster. The world didn’t need another Reaper. But it sure as hell needed Jack Morrison. _He_ needed Jack Morrison.

He watched the man, pleading, praying that he wouldn’t, that he’d stop, would regain some sort of control at the last moment-

His thoughts were interrupted to the sickened crunch of snapped bone. The man was dead, nothing but a corpse. But Jack was still attacking. Bile rose into an insatiable tidal wave, drowning all taste in his throat. He turned to the side and retched, globs of vomit hanging off his mouth in delicate strings.

Jack looked so _angry_ as he attacked, teeth and nails thrown into a whirlwind blur, the only sign of each the latest gash to the body beneath. This was an animal, a senseless beast. Nothing like the man who had fought back, spat in his face and screamed for him to go to hell.

The flap door opened again and two new men hurriedly scurried in, each swatched in bleached bone of labcoat. The pair were soon joined by a third then a fourth as they struggled to peel Jack off the body.

“How strong is this fucking thing?” muffled voices growled to their companion who shrugged.

“Just watch yourself. Doc gets touchy when we get too handsy. Riles it up for feeding time.”

“Poor bastards. Last guy got his fingers ripped off.”

“Christ.” The first speaker swore. “Fucking freak.”

They gave up, jamming a syringe into the back of Jack’s neck. He shuddered, whipping around to launch fresh attack at his assailant’s face, only for his body to drop, falling totally limp.

“ _Careful with the asset_.” Moira’s voice flooded the room via crackled tannoy and Gabriel started, remembering his anger, as he realised that the peverted sicko had been filming this all for his enjoyment.

_”I need it awake for its walk.”_

“Yessus.” The first grunted sarcastically, flipping a jokey salute as they dragged Jack’s unconscious form out, leaving behind only the messy unrecognisable pulp of what had once been person.

 

Gabe took one look, turned to the side and retched again.

_Thing. Asset. It. Reaper_  saw red. They were treating his mate like some monstrous, mindless animal.

 

He stood, slowly, and reached for the next film. He had to see, had to know everything that they had done. So he could punish them a thousand times over for it.

 

_“Training exercise thirty two.”_

The exact same thing happened. Jack in the cage, a person, thrown in. Except this time there was a gun in the centre of the floor. A handful of bullets beside it.

“ _Heel_.” Moira’s disembodied voice snapped, and Jack broke off from his stride, eyes fixed warily on the weapon as the offering, not offering, Gabe realised hollowly, _sacrifice_ , loaded the gun, trembling fingers clumsily jerking the safety off and lining it to Jack’s chest.

He froze, only to laugh at himself bitterly. Moroe wouldn’t kill Jack, he needed him alive.  Just a trick, he told himself angrily. The latest ploy to mould the soldier into submission.

He paled as the shot rang out.

“ _Continue._ ” Moira snaked coldly from above.

Gabriel cried. Broke down to the ground and wailed pitiful howls, his body rocking dangerously to and fro, as Jack sprang forward; the dam of his chest burst open, the smoking metal body fell from the corpse’s hand.

 

“Look at you, such a beauty.” Moira cooed from behind the camera, the angle jerking slightly as one hand fell into focus, stretching out and over Jack’s hair as the man rubbed his body up against the cage bars, slimy fingers patting him over like some lamb thrown to display at a petting zoo. “We’re going to play a little game now, okay, honey? Nice and simple, don’t worry. I’ll say a word, and you tell me how you feel. That’s alright, isn’t it, darling Cadet?”

“..y…e…ssss.” Jack rasped, testing each word as if speaking them for the first time.

“Talon.”

“Lo….yalty.”

“Doctor.”

“O…bee..dee..dance.”

“Cell.”

Jack’s voice cracked as his eyes glazed to half lids. A ragged purr hummed in his throat. “Ho-me.”

“Good boy.”

“Job co…mplete. Ree..ward.”

“Bad boy.”

“Failure.” Jack backed away, hanging his head as his shoulders hunched, a pitiful mewl erupting as he retreated into himself. “Puni…shment.”

“Overwatch.”

Jack stilled, a fragment of life sparking his eyes out of their corpses.

“Overwatch,” Moira repeated, growling a prompt, when Jack gave no answer.

Jack quivered, giving a pained yip as his body collapsed, twitching, on the ground, and Gabe realised with grown horror that the leather around his throat had been swapped to an electric upgrade.

“Enemy.” He choked out, his face mottled blue as he curled in, gasping for breath. “Eliminate.” The jerks stopped.

“That’s better.” Moira purred smugly. “You can keep going for me, can’t you, Cadet?”

“Yes, Doctor.”

Gabe blanched, a snarl lodging his throat as the questions continued.

 

One clip left.

He felt sick as the film rolled. He didn’t know what he’d been expecting. But it wasn’t this. The worst had been saved till last.

The cage was gone. The animal was gone Jack sat, rigidly still, in a plastic chair. He looked almost normal. Except his eyes were empty of anything. Moira was opposite him, leaned forward in anticipation.

“One more time my Soldier- no, my  _Cadet_.”

Cadet. Project Cadet. With a cry he realised that’s all Jack’s life was to them. An experiment. They’d ripped his life apart, torn his sanity at the seams, taken his _humanity_ for an experiment.

 Moira’s greasy smile slid to a smug sneer. “What are Overwatch?”

“A disgusting enemy bringing ruin to the world that must be stopped.”

The words were void. Robotic. He felt sick, stumbling steps backing away from the scene. He had done this. This was his fault.

 “And Talon?”

Jack spoke. Again lifeless. 

“Our glorious organisation bringing hope to hopeless reality.”

“The mission?”

 “To be completed at all costs.”

“And Gabriel Reyes?”

Despair welled, a black hole materialising in the pit of his stomach, swallowing him whole. He gagged, the words that followed drawing all breath from his lips and driving a burnt stake clean through his heart as Jack leaned, suddenly brought to life. “The man I will _destroy_.”

He watched, torn to silent rage, as licks of flame took hold, catching the film to shrivel poisoned edges of clip away. He watched as the material bubbled into pitch tar, before even that had fallen, descended to gravelly ash that he scooped up, dusting minute particles into the wind as the heel crunched again and again over the projector, grinding the machine into irreparable oblivion. He watched as each film he had sat through disappeared into nothing. 

He stormed from the room, robes swept in a wild billow as they ballooned his form, striding down the corridors as smog took hold, tendrils of heat dripping influence through the air. The first charge erupted, rocking his form as he stalked away, totally oblivious to the begged pleas dogging his steps as frenzied thumps of fists slammed against locked doors.

He found the cage. Jack's cage with Jack's blood staining the floor sick copper. And it was empty. Abandoned.

He plucked the still smoking match from his lips, throwing it behind one shoulder as the world exploded. His heels crunched over some solid, a pitiful moan following, but he didn’t bother to look down, merely stepping over the trash, leaving it to burst to ash as agonised screeches of screams lined his back, Jack’s rescue and the excruciating execution of Moroe stained to a silent promise on his lips.    

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is going back to some semblance of organisation - new updates every Sunday.


	24. A Much Overdue Reunion

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Aaaaand she’s back. And oh boy is it good to be. Oh life it really would be appreciated if you took me to dinner first, you know, before bending over and fucking me in the ass? A fuck ton of deadlines and two weeks off on again off again illness later, but here we are. And ooooh, new Overwatch character announcement! Evil scientist playing god with a name beginning with M? Yeah, Moroe’s getting a redo, with a slight name fiddling and sex change.  
> Updates are still going to be Sundays.

Sombra hated a lot of things in life. A client’s cheque bouncing, a mission going wrong, Gabriel Reyes. London was another of those things. The British were so agonisingly _dull,_ their capital even more so. The smog-ridden hub of pollution seemed to be constantly locked into a perpetual cycle of rain or very wet hale, everything from store-bought sandwiches to the greatest getaway vehicles were ridiculously overpriced and the stupidity of the population was bordering caveman. She voiced a sigh, huffing angrily to herself. She’d argued vehemently against the idea, protesting that the circumstances were far too similar, an eerie mirror to the night the creature had first been taken.  Moira had, stubborn as a mule, argued right back; her masterpiece was ready, ready to show Talon, Overwatch and the world the beauty of true despair.

Sombra wrenched her gaze off the city’s pathetic skyline, feeling her lip curl further as she stared at the thing in front of her.

Not a man; Jack Morrison could hardly be described as human now. He stared back at her, large dulled blues and stony set lines of shattered lips betraying something of a glare, even as he stood readied at attention. Somehow even with the conditioning in place he still managed to hate her. Her wrist jerked out disobediently, the pain still prominent even after a week of healing. The doc had told her gleefully she was lucky to still have the limb. Her eyes roved critically up over the shaggy drenched silver dripping over taut shoulders, the scraped nails hardened into stained ragged talons, the near soulless gaze that met her own with the gutted growl of an angered dog. No, Jack Morrison was no human.

She extracted an arm from her chest, the handlers beside the creature shuffling the balls of their feet nervously, jumping in anxious sharp twitches as she slowly reached for the muzzle strapped to the weathered face. He answered her with a cheap grin of feral yellowed canines as she took it from him, slipping the buckled catches off with some difficulty; steel, and thrice reinforced, the howl and writhing body of an unnamed grunt dropped to the floor, clenching over the hole where a leg had once stood was the first they’d known of that mistake.

She handed the muzzle to the nearest grunt, feeling his eyes heavy on hers all the way. A twinge of distaste rocked her belly and she scorned herself for showing weakness. They both knew he could kill her, rip her throat out from its flesh as easily as he exhaled breath. It was just a matter of which would be faster; the monster or the remote programmed into her glove, and whether whichever punishment Moira cooked up would be worth it.

She lifted a brow, daring, goading him along. He held for a second, two and three, but dropped his stare to snap stretched teeth towards a handler stupidly gotten too close. The arch fell back into its aloof sneer. A fight for another day then. She ignored the goon’s whimpers, Moira would argue it was the man’s own stupidity for walking too close to the beast, and even Sombra, with all her self-confidence and swagger, was slow on wanting to cross the scientist. The good doctor loved her monster, she didn’t know what could be seen as worse; the tortures they’d inflicted to drive the man to how he now stood before her, or the purpled bruises of bites swollen fat under the skin of close-fitting tar uniform. Sombra didn’t care either way, her only thought was to the payment her clients afforded, and Talon’s redhead extremist was extremely generous. So she kept quiet on her disgust for the woman and her creations, and didn’t take the time to dwell on the thoughts of what was worse for the poor sod caught in the control master’s cross-strings.

She pulled back, disgust clearly written on her features as she spoke, words ringing their poor surrounding clearly, superiorly commanding in a voice as vicious as a sharply lashed whip.  “Go get em boy.”

He paused, long enough to leer, to remind that his shackles were chained to someone that wasn’t _her_ , that it was by his choice she still breathed. Eyes frozen cold sparked new life in ravenous bloodlust in a hungered glare that stilled long enough to send the betrayal of a shiver tingling across her spine. Then he was gone.

…

Gabriel’s heart hammered as he crept out of his hiding place, the useless organ thumping, racing a million miles an hour as it slammed the walls of his ribcage. His breathing and steps quickened, feet speeding as they carried him towards the sound of action. This was the night he’d been waiting for. The mission had come in two days ago – a simple assassination of some idiot arguing for omnics rights. Talon’s group needed to be large enough to provide a distraction for Overwatch whilst Widow took the hit. Overwatch had been coming down particularly hard on the organization as of late – repayment for their lost agent, Gabe suspected – and so the decision had been made to send three groups together, the usual number of grunts speared by the Reaper, a smaller formation led by Widow, and a number controlled by Sombra, featuring a new weapon to be field tested for the very first time.  

A shred of excitement speared his chest, his precision-based steps barely holding in a gleeful skip as he sprinted through the warzone, ignoring hails of bullets raining off his back and desperately shouted pleas of help beneath his heels. He wasn’t Talon. Not anymore. He’d stopped ever being that when they took Jack from him.

The communicator he’d snatched off the now deceased sub-leader of his group buzzed, his own remaining silent as the crimson-stained brick flickered into life and Sombra’s punchable tones drawled into his left ear, emotionlessly ordering all agents away from the East. The mad dog of Talon had been set loose. Gabe’s direction paused, his feet swinging off to the right with a new sense of urgency.

The mad dog of Talon.

Jack. Jack was here.

…

He laughed as the bitch fell, going down to drown in the sea of bodies with him at their centre. Taken down by another in black yellow tracksuit.

“ _Cadet!”_ the bitch screeched, slamming hidden dials to their max, and he howled, his vision painted static red as he halted, body freezing in its place on the body of the young male he had far too easily taken down, dark dreadlocks staining over scrunched shut eyelids.

He snarled. **It wasn’t his fault** she was useless. **It wasn’t his fault** she had ended in a position seconds away from capture. **It wasn’t his fault** she hadn’t seen the blur of cobalt before it exploded into a female.

His fingers clawed desperately, wailing as he pulled at the _thing_ strapped to his throat that should _shouldn’t_ be there.

 _Do it right_. A comforting voice whispered in his ear, a ghost hand guiding his own up. Chronal accelerator, Achilles tendons, shoulder. Head shoot the head-

He raised the weapon from where it had been pointed at the youth’s side, lining it to a deadly arc with the woman’s pulsing blue chest, finger slipping off the trigger-

Only to jerk, screaming as a sudden force knocked him to the side and he went down, sprawling, the shot going wide, the female’s head snapping in his direction as the bullet barrelled past her ear, buried harmlessly in the crater of wall behind her back. There was someone on him, angrily snarling instructions of staying down as burly arms wrapped his chest, holding his face down into the stone. He bucked, his assailant yelping as their hold was thrown off and he scrambled free, flipping their position and now on top of them, whirling round to ratted bronze ends and haunted eyes that snapped open in recognition, a horrified whisper of _name f_ alling from their paled lips.

His mouth caved in a stabbed shriek, instinct to _shut it up shut those screams up out of his head_ snapping the rifle to hover over the man’s, _cowboy’s?_ nose.

…

Gabe rushed forward, propelled by adrenaline and desperation – the desperation to this time save Jack when all those months before he hadn’t. He scrambled into a scene that made even Reaper’s stomach turn. He ignored Sombra, the hacker busy embroiled in contact with an enraged Tracer, focusing instead on Jack, his lover surrounded by corpses of civilians, the innocent’s bodies ripped open to pool the ground slippery crimson, perched atop the form of a McCree, the agent seemingly so struck dumb by his assailant’s identity he couldn’t even manage a weak kick. Gabe’s pace staggered then stumbled to a stop. He couldn’t let Jack kill Jesse. Reaper would, Gabriel Reyes, with all the shit the world threw at him, would. But Jack, Gabe realised now, Jack wouldn’t. The man would never forgive himself, would never live with himself, if he killed his friend, practically younger brother.

Reaper’s mask was discarded on the ground before Gabriel had even realised his fingers nearing his face. “Jack!” He screamed, voice hoarse, and the animal stuttered, hands stilling, head snapping up to face the sound as if electrified.

In that moment the soldier abandoned his gun, throwing it off behind him without so much as a thought as he lurched forward, rolling, almost drunkenly, off a now unconscious McCree, eyes bugged wide, teeth bared and lips splitting to a furious roar, falling onto all fours and charged, impossibly fast, straight towards him.

Gabe had no time to react when suddenly jack was on top of him, but sadly not in the way he had always wanted; the man straddling his hips was making no attempt to shed his clothes off to make sweet, sweet love in the darkened backstreet of alley, but rather doing everything in his power to stop their owner from breathing. Gabe disintegrated into fog, slipping out of the hold and just narrowly missing a mouthful of his shoulder ripped out. Jack gave a frustrated snarl, teeth and hands scrabbling uselessly over the mist to find a hold, the snarl rising to a howl when he found none.

Gabe slipped his body on top of him, becoming solid and clocking his lover’s skull square with the end of one of his _Hellfires_ , but the man stayed up, shrugging Gabe and the hit off easily, as if they were both simple water off his back.   

They tumbled like that, rolling off the stone ground over and over, with Jack launching himself to flip Gabe, only to bark in confusion as his prey slipped out of grasp and switched their position, manage to hold Jack and attempt a blow over the head before the man realised the change and threw him off.

Gabe yelped, a lightning fast punch – too quick to dodge – jarring his nose, the bone crunching and clumsily throwing to the side, broken.

“Jack.” He moaned, shaking the stars out of his vision. Jack took advantage of the moment, snapping his fingers to grip over Gabe’s gullet, pressing the digits together, bloodlusted eyes glowing brightly as lips curled over snarling teeth. Gabe stilled, too tired to slip into mist. Jack wanted to kill him. And that’s what he deserved, wasn’t it? After all he’d done? Why should he stop him?

“Do it.” He huffed, going limp as he abandoned all fight.

Jack stilled, pausing, a flash of confusion breaking the bloodlust as he hovered above Gabe, fingers pausing, unsure, in their tight wrap around the man’s throat.

Gabe felt the spark of hope that had died flutter back to life in his chest. “ _Jack_.” He tried again, rasping the name reverently like it was some prayer that could stave off the army of demons hunting him. “It’s me, _Gabe_. I’m here, Jackie. I’m sorry I’m so late but I’m here now.”

The fingers lacing his throat paused, forgotten, as Jack glared back.

Gabriel’s heart lifted. It was working. He was getting through. “They lied, Jackie. I don’t know what they said, but they lied. I don’t hate you. I could never hate you-” His voice trembled and broke.

_“Quiero,” Mocha coffee hand laced over the caramel-licked other’s, guiding the swirl of ink slowly over the paper, his body pressing tighter into the back of the chair, dipping his head lower to rest gently on bare shoulder as ebony raven locks mixed with tangled gold strands. “Te quiero pase lo que pase.”_

“I love you.”

Jack froze, his grip releasing completely.

 “I love you Jack Morrison. So, so, much.” Gabe continued softly. Jack’s body shivered, the adult suddenly a frightened rabbit staring into the crosslights, balking as if about to make to get away, but Gabe clung grimly on, his breath rapid hard pants as he snared hands around Jack’s ankles, pinning him into the straddle. “So please,” He rasped, voice thick to desperation. “Stop being such an idiot so I can kiss you.”

Recognition startled the opposite ramrod straight, tears gathering at the edges of worn, world-weary eyes. “Ga-“ Jack started, speaking as if suddenly waking from a trance, before his jaw locked, the name cut short on his lips as surprise, betrayal, hurt etched the expression, the snap of a trigger ringing as neon stilettos strode into view.

“NO!” Gabe screamed, lurching forward as Jack toppled left, slanting sideways, his head slamming the corner of cobble with a sickening gurgle, lying there, unmoving.

**_NO_ **

**_Reaper_** screamed.

**_Mate mate mate they were going to take his mate away_ **

“Why?” he whispered, broken, as the female stopped her approach, now loomed dizzyingly high above him.

“You really don’t think we didn’t know pathetic, lovestruck Gabriel Reyes had turned traitor?” Sombra sneered obnoxiously. “God you’re even stupider than I thought.”

 Gabe struggled, his mind fading as it numbly collapsed into shutdown, his fingers reaching for Jack, desperate to keep him safe, to never let them take him away again. But Sombra merely laughed, her warbling cackles joining his agonised screech as her stiletto heel impaled his hand, the spike then returning, poking over each digit to force them from his lover, but still he held stubbornly on. This was Jack, he had him, he wasn’t going to lose him, not again.

“He was doing so well too, guess the Doc will have to break her shiny new toy a little more.”

Through his stuttering lashes he saw Sombra grin sharkishly. “You know, I really hoped I would have to do this.”  She simpered, fiercely victorious. She leaned closer, and he whimpered beneath the heel planted off his gut. He saw her lift the gun – Jack’s, he realised, numbly. His original blaster rifle, the Overwatch stamp scribbled over to a crude Talon logo. Felt it settle over the space of his heart. No good, he wanted to tell her. She was too late, the organ was already gone, splattered somewhere besides Jack's slumped broken form from on the bloodstained cobbling.

He felt the jump back, the searing explosion as his darkening world bleached white in pure agony as someone screamed – his screams.

His body jerked back, crashing back and to the stone like a dying fish floundering for water. He yowled, hands fighting the urge to hold over the gash – years of military experience screaming to stem the blood flow, apply pressure, **_ACT!_** – instead clawing at empty space, quickly fading sight dimly aware of _Jack where’d Jack go_ his lover gone, the corpse _not corpse, he’s still breathing she didn’t kill him_ inelegantly slung over Sombra’s shoulder, messy silver of head lolled forwards into the small of the bitch’s back, neck bared to the dart stabbed out the skin.

“Goodbye Gabe,” she sang, triumphant voice poisonous as it fed bile to his mouth. He screamed suddenly, flinching in on himself, the kick spewing the insides of his stomach through a blender. “We won’t meet again.”

He choked on a raged cry, eyes barely open now, despair blanketing his form as she turned, marching off on her heel, taking Jack away with her. Leaving him behind, alone.

It felt like hours but it could only have been seconds when a shadow fell over his face, a flash of grey feather and caramel. Angel. His mind stupidly supplied. So this was how he died. Pathetically, and alone. The great Gabriel Reyes, fearsome Reaper, just some mongrel, lying pitifully forgotten in the street. He deserved as much, after all.

Without thinking, he raised his face towards it, stretching a hand out towards whoever it was, friend or foe.

“Please,” he wheezed, whimpering, raggedly choking on spittle and blood as he begged. “Jack…save….Jack…”

His body was lifted, gentle arms bearing him up from off the ground, whether they were to lift him to heaven, or more plausibly drop him into the darkest, farthest pit of Hell, Gabe didn’t know. He was gone.  


	25. Still Kicking, Still Breaking

_“I don’t care what you’re here for,” Gabriel growled, raking hands through the tangles of his hair as he ranted at the blonde standing, grinning totally nonplussed opposite. He paced back, reached the end of the tent and swung direction, prowling back the opposite way. The same path he’d thundered down ever since learning of his new rooming arrangement. “I don’t want to hear your story either. Don’t even think we’re going to be friends because I’m telling you now we will not. Keep your stuff on your side of the room and don’t go anywhere near anything of mine. Don’t talk to me, don’t look at me, don’t even breathe in my direction or-“_

_“I’m here to make the world a better place.” Morrison interrupted, flashing a set of pearly whites in a wide grin. “Can’t do much of that stuck on a farm.”_

_Gabriel paused, blinking rapidly, his lips quivering, mouth almost flopping open. He ground to a halt, glaring at the straggly lank-limbed youth in open disbelief._

_Most men joined up for entirely selfish reasons like fame, glory and sex, but swept it away with the excuse of selflessness and call to country. The thing was, when Jack said it, doey eyed and practically swelling with pride, Gabriel almost believed him._

_…_

_Jack Morrison was the bane of Gabriel Reyes’ existence. The man had broken each and every one of Gabriel’s carefully laid rules, he chattered incessantly on about anything and everything, exchanged morning greetings, shrugging and continuing the one-sided conversation when none were returned. He left hunks of the best meat, saving the best scraps from the slop offered and leaving them on Gabriel’s pillow to find the next day with a mustard post-it note sporting a scribbled smiley face. Days turned to weeks then to months, Gabriel, much to his annoyance, to Gabe and then Gabi with them. He glared, he growled, he snarled. He shouted at the idiot, stormed out the tent in the mornings and returned late when he was sure the recruit was sleeping in the evenings. He blanked him in training exercises, grabbed his tray and thundered past the ass’s table at mealtimes. And still the man was stuck on some ceaseless self-taken crusade that they become friends._

_Gabriel was taken down ill, confined to his bed and Morrison remained by his side, swabbing the sweat off his brow and spooning sick-tasting medicine into his lips, leaving only to cover Gabriel’s running laps. And after an hour mumbling shamed apologies into the nest grease chaos of his hair._

_Gabriel slipped, tripping over his feet and landing, face-first to the titters of the group around him, into a swamp of mud and algae, the pool made profusely worse by the heavy rainfall of the previous night. Gabriel snarled, face flaring up crimson as he dragged himself back to his feet, hands patting down the muddied uniform. He crawled into bed that night still blushing, the dirtied clothes slung over the ends of his chair to clean the next day. When he woke the next morning the trousers and overcoat were spotless, the shirt freshly crisp and the boots polished so far he could see his own glowering reflection at their toes._

_Jack Morrison was the bane of Gabriel Reyes’ existence. He was entirely sure he hated the man._

_…_

_“Farm boy.” Gabriel murmured sadly as he crouched beside the shaking teen, observing the burst lip, the busted up shoulder, heaving chest and already swollen full purple eye._

_“That’s all I am isn’t it?” Jack slurred thickly. He growled angrily, the bright smile on his face wobbling before trading for a tight grimace. “All I’ll ever be. Just a dumb farm boy that can’t even shoot straight.”_

_“That what they’re saying?” Gabriel murmured, reaching in his breast pocket for a handkerchief, scraping straggles of blonde out the way to mop at the cut christening the youth’s brow._

_“Yeah.” Jack spat, the reply descending into a hacking cough, a dribble of blood bleeding out his lips. He shuddered, his shoulders deflating in defeat. His body trembled, neck craning, head subconsciously leaning into Gabriel’s hand._

_An ink streak arch snaked up into his brow as Gabriel’s lips pursed. “And you listen?”_

_Jack barked out a bitter laugh. “Yeah. I really am dumb, aren’t I?”_

_“No you’re not.” Gabriel muttered, shocked as the words fell out of his mouth before he could pull them back. “Come on,” he shook his head, half his self wondering what the hell he was doing, the other half already strangely resigned to his fate. He really did hate Jack Morrison. He swept the handkerchief over the bloody opening, swabbing the crimson drool away, his other hand stretching out an invitation to the boy that was gladly grasped. He hauled the youth easily to their feet, clapping the hand to their shoulder as they swayed drunkenly. He sighed, accepting defeat disgracefully. “Let’s get you cleaned up.”_

…

Gabriel laughed as he blinked and the world slipped away, tent flaps and greenery of grass shifting to the darkened nothingness of abyss. The sound was ragged, rattling round in the remains of his ribcage as he floated, unfeeling through the fog.

His hooded eyes peered through the darkness, glaring at the monsters that threatened to pull him back under the swamp of memories he’d repeated to himself, over and over, replaying them alone and sobbing, crawled up into a corner as he cried so often.

He wondered, brokenly, if this was Hell.

…

“ **Failure**.”

Cadet hissed, eyes bugging as it followed the length of copper mane to the arm and the lash of leather clutched, pooling the floor as its extension. It watched the snake’s movements, the coil shifting to shimmer side to side before jumping in a tightly controlled leap, one moment slathered over the tile the next suddenly gone and a new welt littered Cadet’s front, the fresh ditch birthed with a wailing screech as the leather parted off searing splayed open flesh.

“You failed, agent. You brought this on yourself. Now we will know why. Why did you not kill the girl?”

“I would have.” _Liar._ “The newcomer knocked the shot off.” Cadet lied. Shivering.

“You’re lyiiiiiing." The redhead sang, eyes glimmering triumphantly. "Remember what happens to little piggies that tell porkies, Cadet?”

Cadet blanched. Watching the whip. “Yessss.” He whispered, dragging the word across his tongue raggedly.

“Why did you not kill Agent Lena Oxton?”

“She was familiar.” He confessed, eyeing the whip fearfully, wondering when the next strike would come. Whether it would hurt more or less than the rest. Nails scraped, straining skittishly over the barbed wire lashing fists into place. “I did not want to shoot. I was torn. And then I was interrupted.”

“Why did you not kill the newcomer?” The Doctor repeated gleefully leaning forward in anticipation.

“He was familiar too. Like we had met before. A dream, maybe. He seemed nice. Pleasant. I liked his presence.” The sentence broke to a whimper, so sure the next attack was coming now. Cadet had disobeyed, openly gone against orders. He had been punished worse for less.

“Oh dear love," Soft tones simpered, cooing sweet sugared honey as they wrapped around his head. "He has confused your mind, he’s trying to turn you against Talon, against us. You know I hate to do this, I really do. But we can’t have him running off with our best asset now, can we? I’ll make it up to you later darling, but for now we have to make sure someone has learnt his lesson.” The whip lifted. “Repeat after me, Gabriel Reyes is not _nice_.”

“Gabriel Reyes is not nice.” Cadet choked, howling as the first lash landed, striking square across its shoulder.

“I do not know Gabriel Reyes.”

“I do not know Gabriel Reyes.” Cadet gagged as the air was punched from his lungs.

The whip rose and fell to catch, lashing, impossibly tight and pulling all the breath from his lips, around his throat.

“The next time I meet Gabriel Reyes, I will shoot to kill.”

Cadet gasped, forcing the words from his pale, turning blue lips.

“The next time I meet Gabriel Reyes, I will shoot to kill.”

…

Gabe jolted back to the land of the living with a sharp gasp, the light too bright, the bleeps to his side too loud. He panicked, his head snapping to the side, blindly searching for any signs of dark fog ooze. He shivered, his body throwing forward only to be suddenly stopped and yanked back in place. His eyes blinked daze out from their corners to see an IV cable sticking out his arm and a gun cheerily jammed into the front of his nose.

“ _Jesse_.” Spun gold and rouge lips scolded, sloppy bun bobbing in its place as its owner’s head whipped to reprimand the man on their left. High heels clacked together as their heels spun to face the bed’s occupant, white sheathed arms folding into their front. “How many times must I tell you, no weapons in the med bay.”

The mass of Jesse McCree growled, huffing breath like a raging bull pawing the ground about to charge, raging eyes alight as if he’d just found the perfect matador to gore, but he eventually surrendered, drawing the gun off of Gabe’s face albeit reluctantly, clipping it into his holster with a darkened scowl.

“I get that you hate to see death Ange, really I do.” The scowl deepened. “But just tell me why. Why him? That ain’t no stray puppy for you to brush the fleas off and send away looking real nice. God sake’s Doc, he’s a murderer.”

Gabriel froze as the blonde offered a small, kindly smile. Tears threatened to spring out; the act so guttingly _Jack_ it was painful. “He’s changed.” The medic murmured softly, still holding the smile.

Jesse’s head bucked as he snorted, showing exactly how much he believed her. “Leopards don’t change their spots Angie. Same goes for fucked in the head sickos.”

“He’s changed.” Angela repeated, quietly adamant, her voice ringing fierce despite its soft coax.

“Hanzo,” Angela murmured, wrenching her focus from the breaking down mess to the raven leaned against the far wall, face all but expressionless save for the eyes narrowed ever so slightly, hawkishly watching the trembling rise and fall of tanned shoulders wrapped in a tatters of crimson blanket. “It may be for the best that Mr McCree leave the room for a while. Can you take him to his quarters?”

The Shimada moved as if walking were a fine art; detaching from the wall and swooping to the broken man’s side in one fluid motion, an arm unfurling from well-muscled side to curl around Jesse’s waist and slowly coax him backwards.

“I’m sorry,” Gabe’s voice cracked on the word. “I didn’t want it to end like this.”

“No.” Guilt pricked, his heart plummeting further as McCree snarled, falling limp in Hanzo’s arms as the archer dragged him away. “Jack’s the enemy. He hates us, tried to kill us. This is exactly what you wanted.”

“Ignore him.” The doctor smiled but her eyes were far off and pained, her voice a light shiver to it. “He’s just upset. Do you know who I am, Mr Reyes?”

“Reaper.” Gabriel snarled out of habit.

“Mr Reaper.” The blonde gently corrected.

“Angela Zeigler, Overwatch’s good doctor. And my apparent saviour.” Gabe gagged on a bitter chuckle.

“That’s right. Do you know where you are?”

“Not where I should be, that’s for sure.” Gabe offered his own grin, all sharp teeth and scariness. “Not have the guts for torture chambers, Miss Ziegler?”

“Angela, please.” The warm smile chilled, ever so slightly, but still enough to be noticeable. _Angela_ clucked her tongue in between her teeth, irritated. “And no, we do not subject our guests to those sorts of exercises Mr Reaper.”

“Guests?” Gabriel drawled the word sarcastically. “That what we’re calling prisoners now?”

“You are our guest, and you need to heal.” Angela murmured, coming forward and exchanging the clipboard for a plastic syringe drawn out of one of the pockets hung off her hip. She leaned over, pressing the point into the space just above his elbow.

Gabe readied himself for the first flash of pain. His features must have betrayed his surprise when none came, instead a soft buzz and gentle numbness he knew far too well, because the blonde rapped nails across the tube, briskly murmuring, “Painkllers.” Her eyes danced to amusement as she gently slid the needle from the flesh. “Believe me, you’ll need them. Your friend did quite a number, you’re lucky to still be breathing.”

“That bitch is no friend of mine.” Gabe snapped, hissing in anger at the mention of Sombra. That back-stabbing bitch, when he found her-

“No she is most certainly not.” The healer interrupted his thoughts before they could start playing keepy up with Sombra’s disembodied severed head. “Multiple broken ribs, just barely missed a punctured lung, fractures in right arm and leg,” Angela read out, robotically listing each injury off the clipboard held at her front. "Concussion, cracked open skull,multiple wounds to back and front." She paused, looking up, her striking eyes piercing through his own. Her lips softened. “You’re very lucky we found you in time.”

“Why are you doing this?” Gabe croaked in barely a thin whisper.

“Because it’s what Jack would want.” The female clipped out, breath a harsh jolt, catching on the name.

Gabe swallowed and lay back down, suddenly feeling sick, his heart singing agony in a way no bullet hole ever could.

“I really didn’t mean for things to turn out like this.” He rasped in confession. “I never wanted to hurt him, if I’d have known the soldier they wanted was him, that he was still alive then I-“ he paused, unable to finish. He thought it best not to tell his saviour and the only thing preventing sixteen or so bullets to the face that if he’d known Soldier76 was Jack Morrison then he’d have done just the same, except never for Talon. Reaper needed his mate totally safe and if that meant indulging in a little kidnap or so? Well, with the amount of trouble Morrison somehow seemed to get himself into, Gabe was beginning to incline to agree. Both beings had that one thing in common – Jack needed to be safe. And theirs.

Gabe watched through fast-fading light as the doctor began to busy herself over the side tray, clipping over pointy scalpels and wicked tools more appropriate for intimate torture than any medical procedure. No, he decided firmly, mind beginning to grow hazy as the drugs began to take effect. He would not be telling any of the strike commander’s former team his plans any time ever.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> WOOWEE WE'RE BACK IN BUSINESS BABYEH
> 
> Yeah I know it's been a long time since I've seen you all and there's a perfectly good reason for that...which I can't give. Just know shit hit the fan and I've been run off my feet. What I can tell you is that I'm super sorry for not updating - but hey, you get two updates today! One for this and one for Little Wing, my slightly more upbeat, more consentual but still just as angsty, other fic! So uh, don't kill me, pretty please?
> 
> Updates are returning to their normal schedule too!


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